The cheese and the worms
by malintzin
Summary: Sometimes, oblivion is the easiest way out when one can't see there are always people to help.Jack centric. JS. Original character.
1. Friday 13th

Hey, it's me again. Here's the corrected and, I hope, improved, version of the prologue. Hope you'll like it!

Many thanks to DianeM for being a wonderful beta!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything, that's why I work for a living. And I borrowed the title of this fic to a great historian named Carlo Ginzburg.

**PROLOGUE ****FRIDAY 13TH **

**_Friday, October 13th, 2006._**

**_Brian Woods, 14 years old._**

_**49 hours missing.**_

_**Last seen shoving a gun on a classmate's face.**_

_Shit…_

Just like that. A simple thought that crosses your mind while everything around you decides to move in a slower fashion, like in a clichéd action movie. Or were the people around you moving faster? Samantha falling backward in a yelp after you violently pushed her while raising your gun and aiming at the silhouette hidden behind the concrete, cold pillar of the building in construction; Danny and Martin turning back at your desperate shout, their eyes growing wide as they watch you pushing Sam and raising your gun, aiming at some invisible target, utterly powerless; Vivian and Elena rushing towards you four; the silhouette coming out from his hiding place, gun in hand; everybody, everything seems to swirl around you, slowing, almost coming to a stop then rushing forward in a sort of macabre dance. In the end, it doesn't matter because a millisecond later you're on the ground, blood flowing from your temple, shot by a kid not older than fifteen give or take, shot by the very same kid you just spent two days of your damn life looking for him. From the first seconds, you have had this bitter feeling this Woods kid was bad news anyway.

_Shit…_

Two milliseconds later, you're still able to think, that's good news. Three plain seconds later, you're still thinking, you must have been some lucky bastard. Hey! You can't be that unfortunate in the matters of the heart without a little compensation, can you? Some are lucky and win poker games. As for you, you've survived a parachute training accident, a car accident _and _a shot to the head. Good score, Malone. Well, you could say that if your head didn't seem to be on the verge of exploding, if the voices and noises around you weren't so distant, as if in another dimension, so close and far away at the same time. Actually, _their_ dimension seems to glide further and further from you, and your vision is greyer and greyer from the stars and strange patterns concentrating before your eyes.

_Shit…_

Always hated that sensation, from the very first time you saw stars in the middle of the day just after big Mörner's fist connected with your chin so many years ago to this very day. You can see Danny's wide eyes and, just for him, you try and fight just a little more. Poor guy, he doesn't need to witness _this_ another time. Samantha's mouth is moving soundlessly and, with another effort, you still can distinguish her panicked but always stunning features just before more grey comes and engulfs her. A gentle hand is stroking your cheek, coaxing you into focusing for a few seconds more. Or maybe the said gentle hand just slapped you to force you to stay awake, you can't tell. However, an ironic smile forms on your lips because the grey dissipates for mere seconds, letting you recognize Vivian. Seems like roles are reversed. Now, it's her turn to ride with that damn ambulance and pace for hours in a sordid waiting room, waiting for some cryptic information not reassuring _at all_. Not something he'd wish for his worst enemy, but something his best friends are about to endure just because of some delirious kid who decided to shoot at cops and raised his gun on Samantha.

_Samantha…_

Gosh, you were sure, you were certain you had moved on at last. You were so sure. _Hell!_ Anne almost gave you another kid. You took her and the girls on a two-week trip to Croatia this summer. It wasn't perfect, far from it; you had to put your _blue helmet _on more often you would have wanted to. However, to be fair, for a first try, it wasn't that bad.

_Anne…_

Maybe they could try again, once the trauma of the miscarriage would heal. "It isn't the stress of the abduction," the doctor had said. "Sadly, some pregnancies just aren't meant to be," he had explained. Sure, but it would have been easier to have something, or someone, to blame but just fate. Far easier. Still, they have survived. Things are strained now but not desperate. The girls come and visit on a regular schedule, Anne doesn't spend entire nights locked in the bathroom crying on the little life that wasn't meant to be anymore. _You had moved on_.

At least, that was what your head kept on repeating but it appeared your body didn't seem to agree for it moved on its own volition as soon as you glimpsed the silhouette with the gun.

_Samantha…_

Like the others, she's just a blurred silhouette now, but he can see her shoulders shaking, or maybe he's imagining it. A form tries to comfort her but she pushes it away in a jerk. Or the growing pain on the side of your head is playing with your perception.

_Shit…_

You were sure she had moved on too, hadn't she? She even was the first to move on, wasn't she?

_Shit…_

More and more grey, with a bit of red. More and more cotton in your ears. Your eyelids are heavier by the seconds. Everything's a blur. The guys around you. The memories assaulting you in a whirlwind.

Childhood.

Youth.

Adulthood.

Funny. What did Kevin Spacey say in this movie? 'Your entire life defiles in front of your mind's eyes' in a flash? So clichéd. Never been totally comfortable with this movie by the way, remember watching it along with Maria on TV. Seeing your own couple on the screen, even if distorted by artistic licence, isn't a good experience. But, coming back to the flash thing, you must say the movie isn't quite wrong either. And here you are, quietly reflecting on life and death, your mind wandering without a goal, jumping from a topic to another one without any logic while your friends try to keep you awake. Everything seems so chaotic from the growing silence that claims you. Then, in a last flash, you have the feeling you're just a few seconds from understanding good old Menocchio's conception of the world.

_The cheese and the worms…_ Perfection and chaos. God's Creation and Humans. The life you dreamt and the life you actually lived, this last affirmation being from John Michael Malone only.

_Shit…_

It hurts like hell; some moron is touching your head. Then the pain becomes too intense and morphs into a more worrying dullness. That was what your grandfather always said when examining his legs after the parachute accident. 'If you feel pain, it's serious, it's bothering, of course. But, believe me, son, if you didn't feel anything, it's when I would start worrying for good.' Then he used to add with relieved eyes: 'You've been _really_ lucky you know."

_Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit… _

_Maybe not so lucky after all…_

In the end, you can barely feel the paramedics lifting your limp body and installing it on a gurney. A few seconds later, you're in the ambulance, and someone is holding your hand. You try to squeeze it but your body refuses to cooperate. The paramedic on the right puts a needle in your arm.

Your last sensation is the disgusting sticky wetness beneath you head, on your left temple, on your ear, on your cheek, on your neck, on your loosened collar.

_Then almost everything turns dark._

* * *

Four sad, powerless silhouettes watched the ambulances driving away from the construction site. The first rushing one was transporting their boss, their friend to the ER and most probably the operation room, the other one had a closed bag in its cabin, a closed bag containing Brian Woods' body, dead by a gunshot in the head because he had chosen the shortcut that gives you the impression of power but can end tragically any time. 

_Such a waste._

Brian could have chosen to be the standard teenager, going to school, playing ballgames, dating pretty girls, occasionally being involved in a bar fight… Instead, he had preferred to hang out with the wrong persons who promised him castles in Spain, big bucks and fast cars if he gave them a hand. So he did give them a hand, sold their shit in his school, made big bucks, bought a gun, used it to impress his classmate and make more money. Brian wasn't a monster, however. Just a kid who had made mistakes but still could go back in the right track. Just a tool unaware that his _friends_ wouldn't hesitate to get rid of him if things turned bad. And dear God, things turned bad indeed. In the worst way possible, in fact.

_Such a waste._

Brian was dead now and Jack in a frigging ambulance. They had worked so much to find the kid, they had worked so hard. Danny wanted to tell him it wasn't too late, that he still could choose another path if he wanted to. Vivian wanted to protect him from his so-called friends. Jack wanted to get him back sound and safe to his family. However, Brian had chosen. He had thought, God only knows why, that shooting at cops could buy his ticket back in the gang. He had decided the people wearing a badge were his enemies, and not the scum that had forced him to hide in the first place. He had chosen and aimed at Samantha. Then Jack sensed his presence, jumped in his line of fire and fired back in front of his petrified colleagues. Three bodies fell to the ground, one dead, one on the edge of consciousness, one alive.

_Such a damn waste._

* * *

Darkness clouds your vision but it seems you still can decipher sounds. Very distant voices. Vague feeling of moving, or being moved. Gosh, you had forgotten how much you hated those sensations. Because the memories always follow the sensations. Then, it's all this old same damn cinema once again. Fortunately, some memories are harmless. You feel big Mörner's fist connecting with your chin, you remember the sensation of an anonymous knee colliding with your skull whereas you were trying to crawl away from a ruck during a rugby game, you can see your crashed bicycle at the bottom of the most dangerous slope in Pittsburgh once again. 

You were young; those were as many decorations for a deceivably quiet child, then teenager. Then, sadly, always come the memories you'll do anything to forget. The sensation of your parachute breaking, the fall and the crash in the trees brutally assault your mind. The Army took the blame; some guy visibly had been sloppy while folding the parachute back, and paid you a comfortable pension that financed your college studies in Philadelphia. Still, no amount of money can make up for the pain, the heavy medication, the months of physical therapy. The second unwelcome memories is this telephone booth just a few meters in front of your car when your sleepy eyes open just in time. Listening to your pride and restlessness, and taking your car to the physical therapy centre instead of calling a cab as usual hadn't been such a good idea. You had tried to convince yourself you weren't that incapacitated, and, as a result, you had prolonged your convalescence for two months.

_Smooth, Malone, really smooth…_

This state between consciousness and unconsciousness is really a hard place to be, you decide. It's a place where whatever control you thought you had on your mind dissolve into nothing, leaving you without any defence in front of your subconscious. Things you thought important escape from your tiny grasp whereas events or faces you wanted to forget reappear, more precise than ever.

_Make them go away…_

The commotion of your entry into the ER barely registers in your mind, as well as the doctors and nurses you see rushing to your gurney through half-closed eyelids. You would have never perceived their arrival if it hadn't forced the cool hand which had became your life line to let go of your own limp one.

_Bastards…_

Of course, you know they're doing their job. But you're on the edge between consciousness and unconsciousness and you have the right to be petulant and irrational. However, you don't have much time to ponder on this last distorted reflection. The dullness that had replaced the pain is replaced in its turn by an unknown feeling little by little. Soon, this sensation of having your brain crushed becomes unbearable, menacing to engulf him. Your right hand which milliseconds before was mourning the loss of the other hand is brutally disconnected from your brain, as well as the right part of your body. The almost coherent thoughts that were running across your skull like flashes seem to slow down more and more before coming to a stop, as if they were finally frozen.

_Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, shit… Not that lucky AT ALL…_

* * *

They were all gathered in the silent waiting room which had been their only horizon since Jack had been brought to the operating room three hours ago. Not really friendly –no waiting room in a hospital deserves the adjective– the room was decorated in such a way that the families and friends waiting for news about the patients could feel a little comfortable at least. Several bright green plants brought a lively contrast to the cream walls. A coffee machine occupied part of the wall on the right, and magazines were scattered on a small table. You could be fooled and think being in an ordinary waiting room for a routine appointment, if the equally ordinary noises and cries from the ER didn't invade the small sanctuary each time the door slammed open to let a rushing gurney pass in the background, you could be fooled if the other occupants of the room weren't that pale, if their eyes weren't red from unshed tears or from having cried too much, if the silence wasn't that damn thick, only interrupted by the coffee machine, by the pages of the magazines being nervously, mechanically turned, by the occasional contained sobs. Anne was sitting face to the door, clutching her head in her hands, flanked by Danny and Vivian who were trying to comfort her as well as them in the process. Samantha, Martin and Elena were on the left side of the room, sitting shoulder against shoulder, their arms crossed as a way to contain the shaking, their eyes lost into space. No one uttered a single word; each one was fighting their own internal battle to keep it together along with the other people present in the fateful room. On the right side, facing Samantha, an alarmed couple was sitting, clenching their hands together, waiting for news about their daughter who had been knocked over by a drunken driver two hours ago. Next to Danny, a mother and her son were mechanically passing through magazines, exhaustion visible on their faces. They were already there when the group had first walked in the room and no one had come and seen them ever since. 

"Just another day in the ER," Samantha mused bitterly as her tearful stare studied the other persons waiting in the room. As horrible as it seemed, she felt a little of comfort witnessing they weren't the only ones having a loved one in one of those operating rooms. It was petty. It was utterly egoistic. But she couldn't help it. How could she show sympathy whereas the man who had ignored her for the most of the year suddenly decided to acknowledge her existence and prove it by putting his life in line to save hers?

_Bastard…_

How could she think selflessly whereas the new woman in his life, the woman who had carried his child even for a little while was sitting on her left, her head clutched in her trembling hands, her lips forming a silent prayer? However, if she could have petty thoughts about the anonymous yet suffering people around her, she couldn't but feel sorry for the woman who surely was fighting desperately against the horrible hypothesis of losing the man in her life for the second time in less than a year. It wasn't she had never been jealous of Anne, on the contrary. She was still a bit ashamed of the thoughts of slamming a glass door back into her face the few times they walked out Jack's office together. But, sympathy was all she could feel. Actually, she was the one closest to know what Anne was enduring right now. She knew for sure the woman on her left could barely breathe through her constricted chest and throat. She was certain her eyes were burning from the salt of her tears, shed or still unshed. She could relate to her fight against the darker and darker thoughts. And, she had had the confirmation earlier that Anne was conscious of that uncomfortable bond. Samantha had stayed behind in the waiting room after Jack's admission into the ER. Then, minutes later, she had seen a devastated Anne running into the room. Bracing herself against the predicable onslaught about her imprudence, her incapacity as an agent –accusations her own mind kept on harassing her with– she had barely acknowledged the grieving woman. But the onslaught never came. Sad red eyes searched for her own sad red eyes. There was pain in those eyes. There was fear, huge fear. There was some sad, ironic regret too. Maybe the fact that less than a year ago she was in the same situation? However, there wasn't anger. Just some tacit understanding, empathy. After all, they loved the same man even if the dork barely deserved it.

_Bastard…_

But Jack wasn't hers to cry on anymore, so she sat between Martin and Elena, trying to look like the concerned colleague, nothing more. So spiteful anger was all she had left and she directed it towards the man in the operating room: "If you die because of me, I swear I will profane your tomb till my last day. Don't you dare escape like that, Malone! You _owe_ me an explanation, you dumbass. Don't need you to play hero!" Still, all her resentful silent invectives weren't enough to contain the panic menacing to submerge her ever since she first saw Jack lying on the ground, blood flooding from his head.

_Please…_

Martin, while trying to stop his hands from trembling, observed Samantha from the corner of his eyes. Contradicted feelings assaulted him. On the one part, he discovered with horror what the others had been through when he had been shot the year before. He discovered that worrying about a friend going through a serious but scheduled surgery was one thing, but staying in a room with the blood of your friend still on your clothes was a really different matter. Briefly, his stare had crossed Danny's one, had considered his appearance, his bloody clothes –he and Danny had been the ones who had tried to stop the bleeding while Vivian had called 911 and Elena had dealt, or tried to, with Sam– and decided that no mirror could reflect his haggard attitude as well as the man in front of him. So _this_ was what it felt like, feeling that powerless _and_ angry _and _exhausted _and_ frustrated _and _hopeful _and_ pessimistic at the same time. Suddenly, he felt sorry for his cocky attitude towards his friends after the shooting. If he had known what it was like, he wouldn't have…

_Egoistic asshole…_

On the other hand, there was the woman next to him. Samantha Spade. He had seen her earlier in the afternoon, utterly panicked, refusing to leave Jack's side, climbing into the ambulance without letting go of his hand. Some foreigner could have explained this attitude by the fact their boss had just saved her life. But he, Martin Fitzgerald, knew better. The young man sighed, bitter nostalgia insinuating into his heart. He had loved her once. Maybe he still had deep feelings somewhere. But their failure of the year before had taught him one thing. _Don't wait for the other one to deal with your problems._ And, as a matter of fact, his heavy flirting with painkillers addiction, a sweet euphemism actually, was too fresh, as well as the things who sent him over the edge.

_Typical…_

His boss, his friend was in an operating room, Sam was barely keeping it together thanks to her wonderful pride, and seemed in a dire need of some friendly assistance; and all he was thinking about was his little self. The truth was that the shooting had woken up an unwelcome demon named Fear. As soon as he had felt the boy's presence, Jack had acted, a rash movement, but he had acted nonetheless while he had been paralysed by this voracious fear. The fear of failure, of being hurt, of suffering. Today's incident had showed him that if the NA helped him with the consequences of his most profound problem, nothing would be really solved until he confronted his demons face to face. He had to accept that every one is bound to face failure at least once in their life, even Martin Fitzgerald who had had to wait his thirty-fifth birthday to discover this eternal truth. One cannot succeed all the time. One cannot get what they want every time. Maybe helping Samantha as a real friend, and not as an interested one anymore, would be a first step in that direction. A difficult one, but a necessary one. With this last thought, he briefly closed his eyes and took a deep breath before taking Sam's hand in his own, a reassuring smile on his face. "He's some tough cookie; you know that more than anyone." With a single sentence, he acknowledged for the first time her special connection to their boss in a positive way. "Sure he's gonna wake up tomorrow and growl after us because we forgot our paperwork." Martin sighed profoundly. It hurt like hell to become the 'good friend' but it had to be done. Actually, he had been too proud for too long and hadn't wanted to accept that being her friend and nothing more was all he could pretend to. The signs had always been there, he just refused to see them.

Elena sensed more than heard the hushed exchange between her colleagues. The events since this afternoon had confirmed some of the suspicions she had had about some strange dynamics since her first days in the team, but wouldn't dare and judge them. She liked them too much. Samantha was a good partner and working next to her and Jack day after day had helped her to rediscover her sense of compassion she had buried while entering the NYPD. She would never admit it, even in front of the executioner, but the umbrella Jack had brought back from Japan adorned her living room in spite of her daughter's comments about its 'ugliness'. She had learnt so much thanks to them, thanks to Vivian who had taken her under her wing for the first months, thanks to Danny who had been elegant enough not to mention her former husband and one of his very good friends –so good friends that Santí had chosen him to be little Iñes' godfather. After a few rough months, things had seemed to come back to some normalcy between them. She would never know what Santí had told him about their divorce, and what Danny had believed, but he appeared to have accepted she wasn't the only 'bad guy' in the story. Finally, she had felt she could stay for a while with this team; she had begun to share their compassion, their never ending hope, to fear for their safety and well-being.

_Dios_ _mío…_

And there she was, sitting in this _maldita_ waiting room with the others, anguishing just like them about their boss's life. _Demasiado_ _dolor._ For a few seconds, she wished she still worked for the NYPD. But Vivian was right. Working Missing Persons was a drug, and working with them was something she never dreamt about when she applied originally for White collars. So she gripped her medal dedicated to the _Virgen_ _María_ and prayed for the man in the operating room, for her new friends, for the woman next to her containing tears for a man who is no longer hers to cry, for the man next to them who tried to comfort the girl he loved while she worried about another man's fate.

_Dios_ _mío, Señor Jesús, santo Cristobal, escuchen mi oración y ayudenlos por favor._

* * *

Your thoughts seem to start moving again, the pressure in your head isn't that strong anymore. That's maybe good news. Maybe. Because as soon your brain starts functioning again, an unbearable pain explodes in your head, your skull, your brain. 

_Stop._

But the throbbing pain's still here, ten times, hundred of times worse than the agony you felt in your crashed legs.

_Stop!_

The pain doesn't stop, on the contrary. It goes on and on, invades your brain, paralyses your thoughts, makes delirious images dance in a whirlwind. The endless fights against other kids, against your mother's suicidal tendencies, against your hierarchy… Your mother in the fuming car. The bottle of vodka you emptied after your first mission in the military. The trees rushing towards you. The telephone booth. Gunshots resounding on the phone. Sam in a hospital bed, as pale as her sheets. An empty apartment. Holding Max's body. Clutching to his father's body. Anne in a hospital bed, as pale as her sheets. The silhouette behind the pillar. The gun. The gunshot.

_Please, anyone, make this stop!_

And, finally, somebody seems to listen to your prayers for once. Suddenly, the pain disappears. The haunting images disappears.

Everything is dark.

No sound.

No feelings.

Nothing.

* * *

As silently and quietly as possible, Danny got up, trying not to wake up Anne who, exhausted, fell asleep ten minutes ago. Four hours since Jack had been admitted in the operating room. Four fucking hours! On shaky legs, he walked to the coffee machine. More than a mere hot beverage, he needed something to do, something to occupy his hands. It was the same nightmare all over again! At least, when Martin had been injured, they had been able to focus their frustration, their anger in a hunt for Dornvald. But this time, the culprit was already dead. There was nothing to do, absolutely nothing. Tears were burning his eyes. He couldn't believe it. How could he have missed the kid? How could he? The concern of not disturbing the other persons in the room, friends as well as strangers, was the only thing that prevented him to hit the machine or a wall again and again till he couldn't feel his fist anymore. 

_Puta_ _madre… Si no sobrevive… Si no sobrevive…_

He hadn't shown it lately. Well, honestly, he hadn't shown it for more than a year, but Jack always had been his model. Since the first minute he had put the man on a pedestal. The guy was everything he wasn't. He was a calm, focused boss who had taught him almost everything about the job. He was a loving father for his adorable girls, the kind of father Danny wished he could have had. That was why he had been so disgusted by his boss outburst at the end of the Terry Cotta's case. He couldn't understand him anymore. He had offered the position to Vivian, then had taken it back. The Jack Malone he knew didn't do this kind of things, did he? Meanwhile, Danny had discovered his affair with Samantha, which had contributed to shatter the idealized image in his head a bit more. That was why he had ignored his advice after the shooting the year before. And he had screwed up, repeatedly, which Jack had told him the hard way. Danny still could feel his boss's strong hands on his collar after the case of the bomb in a high school; he still could hear his angry words. His proud nature had taken time to perceive the fear behind the furious threats, to accept Jack had been right to rough him up at the time, to force him to open his eyes before something serious happened to him like any panicked father would have done. It had been a much needed wake up call, really.

_Alguién, por favor…_

Danny's musings were finally interrupted by a soft knocking on the door. The young man turned back and saw the exhausted but quite serene surgeon calling for their attention.

"I'm Doctor Thomas. I suppose you're here for Jack Malone, aren't you?" he enquired without any preambles.

At the sound of his voice, Anne jumped on her feet and walked to him, clenching her hands in front of her. Vivian followed her while the others stood where they were, unable to move, holding their breath unconsciously.

"Yes, yes…" Anne stuttered and stopped, her mouth moving soundlessly, unable to ask the true questions.

Putting a comforting hand on the woman's back, as much to reassure Anne as to comfort herself with this tiny human contact, Vivian asked the dreaded question:

"How… How is he?"

The surgeon let out a deep breath.

"Actually, I must say your friend is some lucky man. The bullet just grazed his skull and, except for a small fissure, didn't cause irreversible damages. Still…"

Anne, whose sanity seemed to depend on the surgeon's words, winced worryingly:

"Still?"

Jack Thomas sighed again. He hated this part, really. How can you explain to worried families that everything is reassuring but that the loved one isn't waking up soon?

"Just like I said, Mr. Malone's condition is reassuring; really. But the shock of the grazing bullet caused a serious trauma and the formation of a subcranial haematoma. Fortunately, we have been able to begin to drain it."

"But?" This time, this was Vivian who pressed the surgeon to go on.

One last sigh.

"We decided to plunge him into a medically controlled coma in order to observe and control the evolution of the haematoma, to protect his brain from further suffering."

A collective, predictable gasp resounding in the room. Patiently, Dr. Thomas went on:

"Like I said, it's medically controlled. Mr. Malone wasn't even near comatose state when he was admitted into the hospital. It's just a protection."

"And you're saying you'll wake him up whenever you judge it possible?" Samantha asked with a trembling, unbelieving voice.

"Exactly. As soon as the evolution is satisfying, we'll stop giving him the medication," the surgeon explained calmly.

"How long?" Anne enquired, her voice barely above a whisper.

Dr. Thomas shook his head.

"I can't say. A week? Two? Now, it's just up to Mr. Malone's capacity to heal."


	2. Reminiscences part one

So here's the first chapter, enjoy!

Again, a big thank you to Diane, and to the people who reviewed the rough draft of the prologue so kindly.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything. I'm just playing for a little bit during my holidays.

**CHAPTER ONE: REMINISCENCES**

**Part one: The new kid in town**

_Sweden, July 17th, 1969_

_Damn_

You knew this guy was bad news. You knew it.

_Big arms, big fists, big mouth._

_Big asshole._

You were sure of it and now you have a vicious black eye and sore ribs to prove you were right to anyone willing to listen to you. Big Sven Mörner, captain of the local school hockey team is an authentic bully, the kind of kid that can make your life a living hell when you're the new kid in town. _Damn_. Wherever you and your mother follow your father, Europe, Asia or the good ol' USA, it's always the same crap. You escape from the new house just not to listen your parents arguing –no, scrap that, yelling- about the central heating that isn't functioning correctly, about the kitchen which is too small or your late grandmother's service which has lost another of its diminishing crew during the move. Your mother cries it's the last time she accepts to follow your father's every move; he yells back she doesn't understand him, she never understood him and both don't notice their ten-year-old son had vanished from home one more time.

_Damn._

It's always the same crap. Your parents fight and you decide to discover the place you're going to call _home_ for, what, a year, maybe more, on your own. However, as hard as you try to be transparent, there's always something different about you that attracts much unwanted attention, that inevitably brands you as the new kid in town in the best cases or as the stranger, the _Army brat_, the _Yankee_ kid in the worse ones. It's when your problems usually begin. You walk in this new place on your own and kids notice you. After the first contact, there are two options: you're in an English speaking place or you're not. The first one helps the communication but doesn't make the integration an automatic process. The second one comes and complicates the matter a great, great deal. Nonetheless, wherever you move, being the new kid in town is always a problem; the only thing that varies from a place to another is just the difficulty of this problem. Indeed, even if you're lucky enough to avoid a painful first contact in the streets, there's always the first day in your new school when the teacher introduces you to the whole class, a seemingly protective hand on your shoulder, and asks them to welcome you as best as they can. Of course, most of your new classmates are ready to do as they're told, thankfully. However, there are those kids whose lips the teacher's words inevitably put this same ironic smile on. In bloody Arkansas, last year, there were this kid and his dumb friends who always made fun of your accent from Pennsylvania until you tricked them by leading them to old Casper's backyard, then letting them deal with his two dobermans. The two previous years in Manilla had been a living hell but, in the end, they had taught you a thing or two you didn't wait to put into application.

_First, being smarter_. It had worked wonderfully in Arkansas since, after the incident, you wonderfully succeeded into getting those kids off your back for good.

_Second, being tougher_. This last lesson is definitely the one you'll need to remember to get rid of big Mörner's bullying.

_Damn._

Your ribs ache horribly as you miserably push you bike back home in the Swedish fresh summer. Your black eye stings as you try to imagine some plausible story to explain the way you look to your parents. However, your mind and muscles are too sore from the vicious beating to let you be creative, so you settle for the classic but always reliable tale of the stupid dog that ran across the street chasing some no less dumb cat. With a bit of luck, they will be too busy fighting each other to think and verify your story further. It's not you like it when your parents fight, on the contrary, but right now you really don't need their attention, just a full night of rest.

_Damn._

You can't help a grimace as you push the front door open soundlessly. The pain from your ribs has worsened since big Mörner left you on the ground an hour ago. You throw a tentative look across the bright living room and discover your father quietly sitting on the sofa and reading the daily newspaper while you hear your mother busying herself in the backyard from the open window. Wherever you and your family moved, she always found a way to try and, when you stayed in the same place for more than a year, create wonderful, colourful gardens; a non-ending task she stubbornly started up after each move just like Queen Penelope and her weaving in the book you finished last week. From your tentative look, everything is calm and serene, something you'd be delighted to witness and enjoy if you didn't have a black eye and aching ribs to explain. You take a calming breath before announcing your presence.

_On with the show…_

_**

* * *

Saturday, October 14th, 2006**_

Vivian took a deep, trembling breath as she contemplated the immobile, lying form in the ICU bed.

_Not again._

Her operation from the year before had prevented her to stay at Martin's bedside. Of course she had tried to convince Marcus and the doctors to let her visit her young friend, but, in the end, their logical, reasonable arguments prevailed over her obstinacy. However, not being able to see her unconscious, wounded colleague as soon as she would have wanted hadn't prevented haunting images from alimenting her recurring nightmares, on the contrary. Moreover, she was sure the images had been all the more vivid as she hadn't been able to reassure her fears by seeing Martin with her own eyes, and not through her friends' optimistic words that contradicted their red eyes so much, by touching his immobile but warm hand with her own. That was the reason why she still stood there outside Jack's room when everybody else, even Anne and Samantha, had finally gone home, silently watching his chest rise and fall thanks to the breathing assistance, quietly listening to the regular sounds coming from the heart and brain monitors, avid to perceive any tiny evidence confirming her old friend was well and alive even if the doctors weren't going to let him wake up before they were satisfied with the evolution of the haematoma. At least, that was what she had understood from Dr. Thomas' explanations the day before. In a nutshell, Jack wasn't out of the woods yet, but there were good chances that all these emotions would be only bad memories in the end.

_Hopefully._

Her eyelids were heavy from exhaustion, her feet and back were beginning to ache from standing for too long. Marcus had called an hour ago to check on her and tell her to come back home, to get some rest, but she was unable to walk out, as if her whole body was petrified. She just couldn't move: the weight of old, bitter, unresolved arguments and unsaid words of reconciliation was simply too heavy. An ironic smile formed slowly on her lips. It was amazing. Even after the shooting and Martin's injuries, she had taken for granted that she had more than enough time to rebuild her friendship with Jack. As a result, more often than not, she let the reasons why, most of the time legitimately, she was pissed at him prevail over the need to try and soothe their disputes, to reduce the growing gap between them. First, she had blamed him for months for her aborted promotion. Of course she knew it wasn't his fault, at least entirely. To be fair, he certainly didn't choose to be dumped and left behind in New York this way by Maria. However, the way he had acted afterwards, as if there had been no way to foresee what had hit him, had literally enraged her, even more than the matter of the promotion actually. And, boy, she had made sure he knew how she felt about his recent and less recent behaviour that evening almost exactly two years ago. Blinded by rage and disappointment, she hadn't been able to stop the harsh, hurting words from flowing and filling the darkened car. She had blamed him for the rampant machismo and veiled racism in the Bureau, for believing he could cheat on his wife then not facing the consequences, for endangering Samantha's brand new and much needed relationship with Martin, for preventing her from moving on at last simply by staying in New York. She almost blamed him for the awful weather they were driving in. Something had been broken during that fateful summer 2003. _This _Jack wasn't _her_ Jack anymore. At least, _her _Jack, as far as she remembered, wasn't this pitiful cheating guy. Of course, there still were glimpses of his old stubborn and generous personality, thankfully, like during the Knowles twin brothers' case or when he offered her his hand the night after she had learnt about her heart condition. She could have taken it. She should have taken it and offered her own in return. That's what friends are made for, aren't they?

_Hopefully..._

Finally, Vivian let go the tears she had been too proud to shed in front of the others while she placed her opened, slightly trembling hand on the separating glass. It wasn't she regretted her harsh words. Regularly, he really deserved a metaphorical kick on the butt, just like no longer than five months ago she had told him her mind about his poor supervision of the black boy and white girl's cases. No, she didn't regret telling him her mind more than once. Those were all the times she didn't find the courage to utter the friendly words stuck in her throat she bitterly regretted. You can't be mad with someone if you don't have great expectations from them, can you? Maybe she had expected too much from him in those moments of crisis. She certainly had expected too much when she had wanted him to stay this same brutally honest, ever reliable hope-junkie whereas his entire world was crumbling down. She had forgotten that even the great Jack Malone has the right to be merely a flawed human being.

_Hopefully…_

Anyway, as the doctor had told them, the guy was a tough and damn lucky one. A timid smile appeared in spite of her tears. Soon he would wake up and she would tell him all those words which had stayed unsaid for much too long. The recriminations about how much he had scared her by acting so boldly, how he had confused the poor Samantha once again and put Anne through hell would come later.

_Hopefully…_

Vivian shook her head, her smile more firm on her lips. Damn, she was just another hope-junkie.

**_

* * *

Sweden, July 20th, 1969._**

_Great!_

Your eyelids are heavy but you struggle to maintain your eyes wide open and keep on contemplating the bright moon from the roof of the house. You stayed up all night and continued your anxious vigil next to the television even when your father had called it quits two hours ago whereas your mother had given up much earlier in the evening. You stayed up all night and you were rewarded at last a little before 4 a.m. by the ecstatic voice of the journalist that announced to the world that Apollo 11 had landed on the moon. Then the blurry images and cracking sounds came…

_So great…_

It's strange to think that at the very moment you're staring at the white crescent, Armstrong and Aldrin are walking on it, or doing whatever they need to do. You're so absorbed by your contemplation you don't hear the quiet footsteps in your room.

"So they landed at last?" your father asks in a whisper, careful not to wake up your mother in the bedroom nearby.

"Yeah," you answer in a dreamy smile.

The tall man leans on the edge of the window to take a look at the moon himself.

"How was it?"

Your smile deepens.

"Honestly?"

"Yep."

"Awful. Dirt everywhere and ink black sky."

"What did you expect, son?"

Your father is smiling too and, in the middle of your quiet excitement, your chest constricts a little. Those peaceful moments are too scarce, much too scarce and fugitive. Why isn't he always like this? But tonight isn't the time for melancholy so you're still smiling when you finally answer in a shrug:

"Dunno. Nothing. But…"

"But?"

"It's wonderful, really. Y'know, they wear these huge space suits that could crush you here but out there they can move as if they were hung up by invisible threads. It looks like they're as light as air balloons. I read this article in the science section the other day about the absence of gravity but I've never imagined _this_, y'know…and then Armstrong said this stuff when he made his first stuff… and… " you go on enthusiastically as you sit up on the roof and emphasize your description with wide movements of your arms. Your ribs don't hurt that much at this moment.

Clearly amused by your sudden enthusiasm, your father comments lightly:

"I see your stubbornness has been rewarded, my boy."

You resume your lying position, your smile bigger than ever.

"Yeah, it's great…"

_Totally, utterly, unbelievably great…_

_**

* * *

Sunday, October 15th, 2006**_

For the tenth time in the last fifteen minutes, Samantha took a deep breath and tried to convince her left hand to leave the wheel it was stubbornly clenching for the door handle of her car.

_In vain…_

She couldn't do it, she just couldn't do it. What if the nurses out there told her his state had suddenly worsened? What if she found Anne there, or, God forbid, Maria? Deep inside, she knew she should have accepted Martin's offer and come with him to visit Jack. This way, she could have maintained the deceitful façade of the concerned colleague. However, despite her gratefulness for his attention, she had turned the offer down. She didn't want to be the concerned colleague anymore. In fact, she couldn't remember a time when she had wanted it since she had always desired more. This idiot had risked his life for her, for God's sake! The young woman hit violently the steering wheel in front of her with shaky fists, barely registering the pain. She was crying again and, one more time, it was his entire fault. Twice he had told her it was over, and twice he had put his own life in line to save hers. Hitting the wheel once again, Samantha desperately tried to chase away much unwanted memories.

_In vain…_

Ashamed of her weakness, she remembered the bench in the park where he had confirmed _it was over_ before, a few weeks later, walking into this bookstore and carrying her out. God! How she had clung to his neck, not wanting to let him go ever again! How she had maintained this tiny contact of her hand on his cheek as long as possible! How much she had hoped everything would be different after this event! And, indeed, everything had changed after that, for the worse as far as she was concerned. He had saved her and he had gone back to his wife. His dear wife who had dumped him less than a year later, and, in the process, pushed her to convince herself it was high time to move on.

_In vain…_

How can one move on when one discovers that the object of their affections isn't going to go away after all? It's impossible and she learnt it the hard way, by making herself miserable in her stubbornness to try and make it work with Martin, by hurting Martin, who didn't deserve it.

_In vain…_

Painful sobs had replaced the silent tears now. Finally Martin had taken the decision she had been too coward to take. For the first time since she had met Jack Malone, they were both free. But Martin had been shot and guilt had led her to his bedside for a while. Then, they finally had been able to talk to each other freely after the Skye Petersen's case. It had been a long, honest, even if painful conversation. They had talked for hours, both perched on the back of a bench in Central Park, about the guilt he felt for wrongly having sent this guy to prison because he had despised this cheating jerk at the time, about her guilt for having destroyed his family. He had told her how sorry he was for her and Martin and, when she had asked him if he was perfectly honest, a nostalgic smile had formed on his lips. She had thought it could be their moment and had put a tentative hand on his shoulder.

_In vain…_

Then he had made her cry once again. His sad, defeated words still rang painfully in her ears while he had shared his bitter realisation with her. They had no future; it was as simple as that. The Bureau rules weren't a true obstacle since one of them could have asked for a transfer, or just could have resigned. It would have been painful to leave a job and colleagues they loved so much, of course, but it wouldn't have been that much of a sacrifice if it had meant they could try to start something. The real obstacle was Maria; Maria who had wordlessly promised that he would never see the girls again if the idea to go back to his _former mistress_ ever crossed his mind; Maria who had assured him she would make _her_ life a living hell if he went back to this _blond bitch_; Maria who was perfectly able to keep this kind of promise, he had learnt it the hard way the year before.

_In vain…_

Then they had agreed they couldn't do this to each other. She couldn't make him lose his daughters for good. He couldn't bind her to a miserable life imposed by a spiteful ex-wife. So they had decided to move on. And he did move on indeed, just three months later. This _old friend_ of his had made her apparition in their lives and everything had snowballed from here.

The visits in his office.

The new ties.

More visits.

His goofy smile. His infuriating goofy smile actually since it wasn't _hers_ anymore.

His panic last spring when Anne had been abducted.

The pregnancy news followed a millisecond later by the miscarriage news. Samantha had discovered then how cruel and heartless jealousy could turn somebody. She had blamed herself for it, but all she had felt then was relief. As if a single, little rock on a road could change its direction.

_Pathetic._

And now, on this Sunday of October, she was crying for an idiot who wasn't hers to cry anymore but who had shattered her best resolutions once again by saving her. She was crying in her car unable to get out of it and make the visit she wanted to pay so badly.

He was _her_ idiot after all.

**_

* * *

Sweden, August 17th, 1969_**

_So much for peace and love… _

For two days stunned newspapers have kept on repeating that, back in the States, thousands of people are gathered just to listen to Dylan, Hendrix, Joplin and many others right now and celebrate the _peace and love_ philosophy. Unfortunately, this "spirit" as they put it in the papers hasn't touched big Mörner at all.

_Big arms, big fists, big mouth._

_Big asshole._

That's all he is anyway. Once again, you try to ignore his stupid provocations. It's not you don't want to make him bite the dust once and for all, on the contrary. But you just bought the single Joe Cocker sang in Woodstock and the radios have kept on repeating since then, and you don't want to take the risk to see your brand new disk destroyed before you had a chance to listen to it. So you push on your pedals with more force. However, the idiot doesn't seem to understand the message as he begins to run in order to catch up with you. And what must happen when a dork is running next to a cyclist happens indeed. His left foot hits your back wheel and both of you fall miserably along with the bike and your precious purchase.

_So much for peace and love…_

Totally oblivious of your bleeding knee, you check immediately on your Cocker single before letting out a sigh of relief.

Intact.

It's intact.

Then you look up just in time to have a glimpse of big Mörner throwing himself at you, his right fist ready to hit. But this time, those are both your feet that violently connect with his stomach. Sometimes, being smaller can have real advantages, and being more agile is one of them. Besides, you learnt your lesson last time. Take advantage of your ability to move faster. Hit first. Don't let him recover.

_So much for peace and love…_

And you don't let him recover. Right in front of his petrified dumb friends, you jump back on your feet and run towards him, aiming at his sternum with your shoulder to make him fall back. And you don't stop. The guy just has time to try to stand up before your left fist collides with his nose as you repeat this very efficient semi uppercut you learnt in Manilla. Finally, you take a distrustful look at the guy's buddies, silently hoping that your demonstration with their "boss" was dissuasive enough, and actually, from the look in their eyes, you discover that the view of big Mörner crying on the sidewalk, his nose broken, is the card that can buy you tranquillity for the rest of your time in this goddamn place. So you square your thin shoulders as you take your bike and purchase back, trying to appear stronger and more confident than you really are, and you ride away without a single word.

_So much for peace and love…_

In the summer of '69, you suffered your first true humiliation, you saw Armstrong and Aldrin walking on the moon, you listened to Joe Cocker again and again and, above all, you stopped being afraid of being the new kid in town.


	3. Reminiscences part two

So here's the second part (out of three) of the first chapter. Not much action, Jack's still in the coma, but a lot of introspection... Hope you'll like it!

Again, many, many thanks to Diane for her corrections and encouraging comments. The title of "eagle eye" Mariel once gave you isn't usurped, I can tell! And I'm adding the title of "speedy beta" because you're working much, much faster than I am!

Disclaimer : I don't own Without a trace nor its characters. I borrowed the title of this fic to Carlo Ginzburg. Go Nagai wrote _Mazinger_ (first published in 1972) and Tetsuya Chiba drew _Ashita no Joe _(first published in 1968).

Enjoy!

**CHAPTER ONE: REMINISCENCES**

**Part two: Paradise**

**_Monday, October 16th, 2006_**

9 a.m.

Gritting his teeth, clenching his fists, Danny almost pushed his way out the elevator as soon as the door opened to escape from the suffocating sympathy filling it. Of course the news of Jack's injuries had reached the least federal agent of the New York Bureau within the weekend. And, inevitably, just like when Samantha had been shot three years ago, just like when Martin had been shot a year-and-a-half ago, it was all the same crap all over again.

The obligatory pity from people who usually barely recognized them in the corridors.

The whispers about the bad luck that seemed to plague their team.

Without forgetting the worst: the infuriating, disgusting comments about Samantha.

_Enough!_

He wanted to yell. Wasn't that enough that Jack was stuck in this fucking hospital bed? Neither he nor the team needed those hypocritical demonstrations. The young agent was so absorbed by his silent, bitter recriminations he almost collided with the person walking to the bullpen from the other side of the corridor.

"Watch out, Agent Taylor," a tired voice warned him.

At the sound of the voice, he looked up inattentively and recognized Alexander Olczyk. Raising a hand to his face, Danny began to stammer uncomfortably.

"I'm sorry, sir; I didn't see you coming…"

A comforting hand on his shoulder interrupted him.

"It's alright, come on in, Danny."

As he walked into the bullpen as he had been asked, the young man finally noticed the dark rings under his superior's tired but compassionate eyes. In spite of his worries and exhaustion, he felt his chest constrict with newfound energy.

At least, somebody outside the team really cared.

* * *

**_Okinawa, April 12th, 1972_**

_Nice and easy…_

From the corner of the eye, you can see the shadows slowly coming back to their natural territory but, anyway, you take your time to secure this last knot before you swim up hurriedly. As soon as you burst through the surface, you take the helping, stretched-out hand and climb up on the small boat. Once aboard, you begin to get rid of the heavy and embarrassing equipment.

"Just in time, _aniki_," your fellow treasure hunter comments as he shows you the approaching fins.

"Gosh," you snort despicably. "They're already back?"

"Yep. I told you thirty pounds weren't enough, the bastards have become quite voracious since we began," Shin'ichi adds with a shrug of his shoulders.

"Almost not enough," you correct mischievously as you take your rope and show him the other one. "Ready?"

"Always."

_Nice and easy…_

Then both of you begin to pull with infinite precaution, first to delicately tend the ropes, then to lift the small wooden chest, finally to take it back to the surface for the first time for approximately three hundred years. Little by little, seconds by seconds, you watch it coming closer, its form becoming clearer in the late afternoon sun. At last, the object of almost two months of hard work since you accidentally discovered it stuck in coral reefs while searching for shellfishes breaks through the surface, instantly becoming way heavier. However, neither of you is caught by surprise; then, finally, you succeed in taking it aboard. The chest is quite small and the metallic frame is deeply corroded by the salty water of the ocean. On the other hand, quite surprisingly, the wood isn't as rotten as you expected it. The incrusted shells you spent hours to clean must have protected it. Shin and you share an impatient, almost giddy look and you reach for your knife.

_Nice and easy…_

A simple, light flick of the wrist and it's over. It's too easy, too quick compared to the hours spent underwater to prepare the chest, the hours dedicated to imagine plans to avert the reef sharks from their territory while they worked on the chest. With precautious hands, Shin proceeds to open the lid inch by inch, trying not to break the rusty hinges. Hey! The chest has been there for centuries maybe, it deserves some respect! Finally, you discover its content. The two old guns -one-shot guns in which you introduced the powder by the cannon, actually- are the proof of the age of the chest: two hundred years, maybe more. You check the rest of the content: a few damaged coins you can try to clean; a medal on which you think you recognize the Virgin Maria and a small cross. You show the last two items to your friend.

"What d'ya think? Portuguese boat?"

Shin'ichi answers after examining the objects with attention:

"Probably. From what Takeyama-sensei explained, the Dutch weren't too fond of this kind of objects, were they?"

"No, they weren't." Then, after completing the exploration of the chest, you ask the question neither of you has dared to evoke since you began to work on it: "Talkin' of Takeyama-sensei, d'ya think he's gonna let us keep a little something as a souvenir?"

* * *

**_Monday, October 16th, 2006_**

Chewing his gum mechanically, Miyabe Shin'ichi reached for the silver cross the nurses had taken off his friend's neck and had put with his other personal belongings on the table nearby. In spite of his heavy heart, the man couldn't help a nostalgic smile as he played with the ancient tiny object. Takeyama-sensei had been very generous indeed. Not only had he helped them and instructed them how to clean the different items they had found, but he had also let them keep everything but four rare silver coins, commenting with mischievous eyes that two guns and two medals less weren't a great loss for his museum even if the law said the contrary. The man suddenly closed his eyes shut, not having gathered the courage to take a look at the bed yet. To postpone the dreaded but inevitable vision, he plunged deeper in his memories. Even if Takeyama-sensei was a _stranger_ from Honshu, the guy really had known how to gain the local people's trust by freely arranging the application of the law: more often than not, he had let the divers and fishermen keep the objects the museum already possessed so that, when they came across something really original, they came to him and not to the dubious traders in town. A passionate, honest guy who knew nonetheless how to bend the rules when they were too straight to be efficient, this was what Takeyama-sensei had been. A true mentor, also. Shin'ichi's smile became more ironic, a way like another one to fight the clenching of his throat. What would his people think if they knew that the way Jack Malone approached his daily work had been influenced by some cunning, treasure-hunting friendly director of the Nautical Museum of Okinawa? They certainly would be quite surprised.

_Aniki, what did you do?_

The man shook his head sadly. As soon as he had heard Maria's panicked voice on the phone in the middle of the night, he had boarded on the first flight to the States. It wasn't he was a big fan of his friend's ex-wife, on the contrary, but he had done it for the girls' sake, and for his own sake. His eyes still closed, he let out a short, humourless laughter. Life can be funny, really. Here he is, by Jack's bedside, called by the very same person who had been the cause of their fight three years ago when the idiot had pitifully announced his intension to go back to his wife just a few days after having put his life in line to go and rescue the girl. God had he been mad at him! He had called him stupid, coward, hypocrite. He had spat he didn't recognize him anymore. Jack had spat back he didn't need his help, he had never asked for it. A fist had aimed at a jaw. A knee had aimed at a stomach. And, like at the time of their first encounter so many years ago, they had neutralised each other: their friendship had ended the way it had begun, with a bloody nose and aching ribs. They hadn't talked or written to each other since then, and, without Maria's phone call, he could have gone on with his life on the other side of the planet without ever knowing his best friend had been shot. Hell! Jack could have died without him ever hearing of it. They had been too stubborn.

_Aniki, look at what you did to yourself!_

So here he was, right there in this hospital, thousands of miles away from home, well decided not to leave the town before having seen his friend sound and alive with his own eyes. Meanwhile, he had to fulfil the promise he had made the girls to give them a daily account about the evolution of their father's condition. Shin'ichi clenched his fists in his coat pockets. The only problem was that, to give this account, he needed to muster the courage to open his eyes at last. You can discover dozens of decomposed corpses, human or animal, without ever flinching during patrols with the coast guards, but nothing can prepare you to see a loved one in a hospital bed surrounded by all this machinery. Fighting his repulsion, he finally took a deep breath and began the count down.

_San._

_Ni._

_Ichi._

_Zero._

"He's so pale," was his first thought.

"Thank God I managed to convince the girls not to come until the docs let him wake up," was his second one.

* * *

**_Okinawa, May 12th 1972_**

_Fuck…_

They can't help it. They _fucking_ can't help it.

Stretched out in the warm sand, the steady humming of the waves a welcome alternative to the screaming you ran from half an hour ago, you grit your teeth as you mechanically skim through the pages of the latest issue of _Shounen Jump_. Of course, you can understand the pressure the current events put on your father's shoulders. Of course, you can empathize with your mother's frustration in front of their neighbours' new coldness. Tomorrow, Okinawa will go back to the Japanese administration after twenty-seven years of American guardianship. Last year, the news was mostly welcomed with indifference. However, as the fateful date approached, old wounds and ghosts made their reappearance, the atmosphere became more and more electric, alimented by the growing tension between the population and the American troops as well as between excited and moderate people from both camps; and your household wasn't an exception, the remains of the broken plates in the kitchen were solid evidences of that fact.

_Fuck…_

You turn another few pages in a blunt gesture before you reach the chapters of _Mazinger_ you were looking for and begin to read. But, uncharacteristically, Koji's exploits against doctor Hell's evil projects aren't sufficient to stop your mind to wander back to the very place you don't want to think about right now.

_Fuck…_

You ran away and you didn't even bother to pick up the pieces of the shattered plates your parents left in the kitchen after they went out to go on with their endless argument in the living room. Just like that. You left your glass of orange juice half full on the counter, you took your book and cleared the floor, unnoticed. However, as much as you desperately want it, you're unable to leave the screaming and the tears behind you.

And unwanted tears of your own come and blur your vision, definitely preventing you from going on and read your much needed diversion. Ashamed of your weakness, you straighten up and brush your tears with the back of your forearm then fix your attention on the endless and hypnotic assault of the waves on the shore, not moving a lash when a shadow stops besides you or when its source sits down heavily in the sand. Motioning to your discarded book, Shin'ichi asks with forced cheerfulness:

"How is it? Koji finally chased doctor Hell's guys away or what?"

As you hear your friend's voice, you can't help but shake your head in amusement. When in trouble, always trust Shin to appear from nowhere. Deciding to answer the question behind the question without further preamble, you murmur with a sad smile:

"They were _that_ loud?"

"Honestly?" he replies with an embarrassed frown; then, scratching his head: "Yeah, I heard them from the street. I figured I'd better avoid the place and come directly here."

"You figured right," you shrug, defeated, ashamed by your parents' demeanour, angry at your father's stubbornness and your mother's incessant changes of mood. Your mother's incessant, chronic changes of mood. This last thought makes you close your eyes shut obstinately for a few seconds. You don't want to go _there_, not now or ever.

The desperate tears, then the exuberant laughter.

The moody silence, then the joyous activity.

The implacable pessimism, then the foolish optimism.

And back to square one.

_Fuck…_

To be honest, she has been this way for a long time –the signs have always been there, you just weren't able to read them until recently– but it seems as if the last family move to Okinawa took its toll on her already delicate equilibrium. Whereas you have found there a whole new and exciting world to discover, a place that you could call home, people that you could call friends at last, she has never been able to adjust to the people whose language she doesn't understand, to the tropical weather and its seasonal typhoons, to the feeling of being the prisoner of this small island. And the monthly, exceptionally weekly changes of mood became regularly weekly, daily even...

_Fuck!_

"What's wrong, _aniki_?"

Of course, your sudden, sad introspection didn't go unnoticed. However, as much as you want to confide in your best friend, unexplainable, shameful reluctance prevents you from uttering the words.

"Nothin'. They piss me off, that's all," you lie as you fight against the stubborn tears.

"Really?" comes his doubtful answer and you know you didn't fool him. But you don't want to talk, not now, not ever, so you ask, avid to drop the painful topic:

"By the way, what are you doing here? Thought you were on cleaning duty this week."

An amused snort and a conniving wink.

"For these things, I'm faster than Tetsuwan, y'know," he answers nonchalantly as he lies down on the warm sand, resting his head on his crossed forearms.

A true smile forms on your lips, at last.

"Be honest and tell me you promised Yoshitsuki you were gonna give him the results of tomorrow's math homework."

"Well, to be honest, I've already given him the math results _and_ made his English essay _and _his history essay for next week," he specifies with a deeply satisfied grin. "Guess I've bought my way out of cleaning duty for this week."

The smile becomes full laughter, and the image of your parents arguing at home fades in your mind at last when he adds, winking again:

"By the way, thanks for the trick, _aniki_."

"Anytime, man, anytime," you answer as you lie down too before going on: "Guess it means you'll be there for the ceremony tomorrow?"

"Sure. Big music and flags, fireworks, I'm not gonna miss it. Just hope there won't be any problems."

"Yeah, my father told us there were consigns about keeping low profile these days and tomorrow above all. But it doesn't mean jerks like Colonel Haines's son and his pals aren't going to screw up."

"Suppose they haven't bought a brain since we last kicked their asses, have they?"

"Nope, just like the guys from Kita, they don't understand anything," you reflect aloud, briefly remembering the last fight that opposed them and a few friends from class to the 7th grades of Kita junior high before asking timidly, reorienting the conversation once again to a much more pleasant topic: "Think Saeko and Kaori will come too?"

A surprised pause.

"Guess so."

A realising stare.

A teasing smile.

"You've got a thing for Sae-chan, don't you, _J-kun_?"

Blushing slowly creeps up your face and you stutter: "Don't call me that, you bastard!"

"You're not answering…" he teases further as he takes your discarded _Shounen Jump_ discretely.

"Whatever!" you blurt out.

"So, you have a thing for Sae-chan…" he goes on with a broad grin and opens the book, directly reaching the _Mazinger_ pages, totally oblivious of your furious stare.

* * *

**_Monday, October 16th, 2006_**

Just like the previous day, the day before last and, most probably, the following day, Anne wearily strolled down the alley leading to the Saint Andrew Hospital entrance, a path she was slowly learning to hate with all her being.

_This can't be happening…_

However, as much as she wanted to forget the past few days, to deny what had happened, the cold, implacable truth followed her everywhere, harassed her when she tried to find her sleep alone in their bed, caught her throat when she woke up in a silent and lonely apartment, continuously attacked her mind when she walked down the corridors of the hospital.

Jack was lying in this ICU room, plunged into a medically controlled coma because he had risked his life to protect a member of his team.

_To save his ex-mistress' life. _

It had to be one of those fate's bad joke. A very bad joke indeed. Max had had this classical middle-age crisis affair which, in the end, had caused his fall. He had lost her trust along with his honour as a husband and an agent. Obviously, it had been the very latter that had imported the most to him: Max had chosen to repair his honour at all costs, even if it had meant he would leave her all alone without really giving her the chance to condemn him for his behaviour, help him to make amends or simply try to understand and excuse him. He had decided to play hero and had left her. _This_ had hurt more than the affair, really, for it meant, in spite of his loving, last parting words, that the job was more important than she. It had hurt, like hell.

_This can't be happening!_

And, who had she chosen to move on with? Jack Malone, maybe the biggest workaholic in the entire New York Bureau, a guy who had had this typical mid-life crisis affair with his young, blond subordinate a few years ago. Talk about irony! Anne barely repressed a sad, bitter smile as she pushed the glass door of the main entrance open with a weary hand and saluted mechanically the receptionist before heading to the ICU through the white, falsely quiet corridors. Of course, _Jack _had made the first, bold move. _He _had convinced her to go on with their relationship, _he _had soothed her doubts. But, to be honest, she had never said no, on the contrary. _She_ had gone to him as soon as she had heard the news about his father's death, convincing herself she was offering help to a friend in pain, nothing else. Wasn't she? Then, everything had snowballed so fast she hadn't found the time to think about what was happening to _her_, what was happening to _them_. For months, the equation had been that simple: alone they were miserable, together, they could find comfort and even quiet, tentative moments of happiness. They both needed it. She was tempted to say, they both deserved it. Was something wrong about it? Until now, she had decided nothing was wrong about forgetting the past and living fully in the present, the future being a distant, abstract notion.

_This can't be happening…_

Nonetheless, the first doubts had crept into her mind months ago, when she had been confronted to loneliness for the first time after the weeks following Max's death. Alone in this cold, foreign room during her brief stay at the hospital after the miscarriage, she had found plenty of time to ponder on the previous year and the conclusions of these sleepless, painful musings weren't pleasant at all; so disturbing she had decided to exile them in the farthest corner of her mind as soon as a tentative, considerate Jack had accompanied her out of this damn hospital. She had had too much time to think, actually, she had been weakened, depressed even –a natural state considering what had lead her to the hospital in the first place, which explained her unsettling reflections. That was what she had kept on repeating herself as she had let him take care of her, help her to heal her wounds. She had decided to ignore the legitimate doubts, a cowardly but comfortable thing to do, and life with Jack had gone on for a little while with its good and bad days, its fugitive moments of hesitant happiness and growing periods of concealed doubt.

Until last Friday.

The first thing she would remember from that day was the unbearable pain in her chest when Vivian had broken her the news of the shooting. The poor woman, usually so confident and comforting, had been barely able to force the dreaded words out of her clenched throat. Jack had been shot a few minutes before and was on his way to the hospital. The moment had been surreal and irrational thoughts almost submerged her too much wounded mind.

Max, then Jack.

Did she bring bad luck?

Was it her punishment for having sought comfort?

Why did they leave her alone?

She barely remembered rushing out of the apartment and flagging down a taxi. She didn't know how she had found her way to the waiting room in the ER. All she had been able to think about were those horrible words. Jack had been shot.

Jack had been shot.

_To save his ex-mistress' life for the second time._

Pausing in front of the entrance of the ICU, the tired woman bit back a strangled sob. What she wouldn't have given to break the girl's neck with her own bare hands! Why hadn't she paid more attention to her surroundings? Why hadn't she noticed the armed boy before he had? She was a trained federal agent for God's sake, so why on earth did she constantly need Jack to save her? How did she dare take him from _her_? The girl was young, she was beautiful, she would surely find somebody whereas _she_ had only Jack left. Anne took a deep, calming, almost ritualistic breath before pushing the swing doors open, bracing herself against whatever piece of news the medical staff would bring her. However, as much as she had wanted to hate the girl, those thoughts had almost vanished the very second she had met the other's distressed, lost eyes, the moment she had noticed the way the other clenched her hands together, the way she bit her lips to contain her sobs, the way her eyelids fought against tears she wasn't supposed to shed anymore, tears she had never been supposed to shed. After having checked Jack's condition with Dr. Thomas, who reassured her about the very satisfying evolution of the haematoma, Anne finished her daily journey to find a hurtful but now familiar sight.

Jack's pale form lying perfectly motionless in the hospital bed and surrounded by all these inhuman tubes and machinery that, paradoxically, maintained him in this comatose state but kept him alive at the same time.

And the frail silhouette of a distraught woman confined in her own lonely hell.

The older woman sighed as she silently walked into the room not without having timidly saluted her _rival_ who, in return, barely dared to look up at her. She noticed the dark circles under her eyes and the trembling of her hands. Not enough sleep and too much coffee. Typical. Anne shook her head sadly, unable to repress her empathy for the grieving woman in the corridor.

Of course the girl was young, she was beautiful, she could find anybody if she wanted.

The problem was she didn't seem to want to move on. Her sleepless, thinning figure was proof of that.

The other problem, the most disturbin one, actually, was that Jack obviously wasn't able to move on either, or else, he wouldn't be lying in this damn bed.

Anne sat down and took his warm hand in her shaking ones. Dr. Thomas had said he wanted to observe the evolution of the haematoma for a week more: if anything, _this_ would give her enough time to think about the questions she had ignored for much too long.

* * *

**_Okinawa, August 16th, 1974._**

"So, you're leaving tomorrow?" the timid voice asks.

"Yeah," you answer simply. Actually, is there anything else to say? You knew it couldn't last.

_It never lasts._

That's why you always tried not to get attached to the different places where your father took you as the years went by; why you always avoided getting attached to the people you met in anticipation of the inevitable heartache. However, you don't know why, this time, you let your guard down. You broke your very first rule, and now, it hurts like it never had.

But, here, you found a place that felt like home, from the heavy scent of the tropical vegetation, the post card beaches to the animated, crowded agglomerations. Even the seasonal typhoons soon became a natural part of your daily life, just like the regular fights with the students from other schools.

But, here, you found people you wanted to get attached to. You found friends: Shin, Takeyama-sensei, the guys from the baseball team. Your heart beat faster in this particular way for the first time when you found the courage, at last, to ask Sae-chan to go the annual fair with you the year before.

_It never lasts…_

And now, you find yourself on your favourite beach for the last time. Next to you, Sae-chan is contemplating the horizon line.

"How's Pittsburgh?" she asks at last.

Much to your own surprise, you smile as familiar images come back to you. Even if leaving Okinawa is the last thing you want to do, you have to admit you like Pennsylvania. Wherever you are, you'll always be a boy from Pittsburgh. You were born there. You made your first steps there. You've got family there. Your very first favourite baseball player was from the local team. You discovered the mountains around the town perched on your grandfather's shoulders.

"The polar opposite from here," you start explaining. "Mountains, snow in winter, no sea. But it is a nice place."

"You've got family there, haven't you?"

"Yep. Both my parents are from Pennsylvania. My grandparents from my mother's side still live in Pittsburgh along with my uncle and his family."

"So, you're going home, you should be happy." There is barely concealed regret in her voice.

"Maybe, but it doesn't make leaving from here any easier, y'know," you answer as you put an arm around her shoulders.

_It never lasts…_

"And, perhaps your mother will feel better next to your family," she adds encouragingly. You're the one that has his arm around her but, in reality, she's the stronger, most comforting one.

"I hope so," you whisper in a doubtful tone. Honestly, you don't know what can make your mother feel better. Sometimes, you feel as it were a lost battle and it hurts. And having the nagging impression that you're the only one to notice the constant degradation of your mother's condition, that your father is more preoccupied by his _fucking_ career than his wife's well being hurts even more.

"They're late," you comment after a few minutes of silence. As usual, when a conversation touches this particular, painful topic, you find a way to reorient it.

"Well," she chuckles lightly, accepting the silent plea to drop the subject. "You should know that Shin isn't punctuality's best friend."

You snort at the sweet euphemism.

"No, he isn't."

_It never lasts…_

Then you gather her in the circle of your arms, burying your face in her silky dark hair, and comfortable silence settles between both of you as you shyly enjoy each other's proximity until the sound of people approaching makes you look up. Shin and Yoshitsuki are carrying what seems to be a heavy pot while the others are bringing logs, drinks and a set of bowls. A broad smile forms on your lips as you recognize the scent coming from the pot. _Champuru_. Your last one. And it isn't any _champuru_, you're sure of it.

"You'd better consider yourself lucky, _J-kun_," Kaori's teasing voice confirms your suspicions. "I had a hell of a time to convince my mother to cook this for everybody, y'know," she finishes as she forces a bowl into your waiting hands.

_It never lasts…_

Then, you notice the large bags on Hajime and Ryou's backs, and your smile broadens even more.

"Those?" the first one answers your inquisitive glance. "They've been collecting dust in our father's warehouse since the last fair. We convinced him to let us fire them."

_It never lasts…_

Finally, you feel Shin's hand on your shoulder.

"You told me you still had an empty box, hadn't you?"

"Yeah?"

"Well, it's not empty anymore," he announces gruffly and drops a heavy bag next to you. "From the gang."

You don't even need to take a look to guess the content of the bag. All the volumes of _Ashita no Joe_ that came out until today.

And your heart is suddenly so heavy you decide you'll never have a farewell party ever again.

_It never lasts… but it's what makes it all the more precious…_


	4. Reminiscences part three

First and foremost, thank you to Diane and her wonderfully quick and efficient beta skills (concerning the job in Spain, I'm still waiting and crossing my fingers…). And many thanks to all the people who stuck with me in spite of my lack of regularity as a writer (and went on pushing me, didn't you, Jbird?)

Disclaimer: even if I have a job now, I'm still poor and don't WAT or its characters. And Carlo Ginzburg's wonderful book gave the title of this fic.

Without further ado, here is the third chapter that concludes the first part of this fic. I hope you'll enjoy!

**Part three: Falling down**

_**Tuesday, October 17th, 2006**_

"Listen, sweetheart. I understand you want to come to New York but you have to trust me here, you don't want to see him right now," the man answered soothingly, his heart and resolve to prevent the girls from rushing to their father's bedside faltering a bit more with each phone call. "Hannah…" He scratched his head in frustration. "Hannah, please… Don't say that. You know it isn't true." He pinched the bridge of his nose in an attempt to find the right words. "Listen, I've already told you, as soon as he wakes up, I'm calling you, I swear." Another pause. "No, I'm not hiding anything from you. Promise." Finally, a deep sigh and a tender smile. "Yeah, me too. A kiss to your sister."

Shin'ichi closed his cell phone before putting it away in his pocket and looked up at the cloudy sky partially blocked by the buildings near by. How could Jack live in such a claustrophobic place? This always had been a mystery to him. Of course they had high buildings in Okinawa, especially in the capital Naha, but, out there, one didn't have this impression of being trapped in a big cage of concrete. However, in spite of all his prejudices about the big city, he had to admit that the polluted but frisk October air was a much better option than the hospital-atmosphere filled with this characteristic, oppressive mix of disinfectant and sickness, so he resumed his pensive stroll across the parking lot of Saint-Andrew until colder, rainy gusts of wind brutally interrupted his musings and forced him to reluctantly seek refuge in the hospital. Walking along the now familiar path to the ICU, the man reached his friend's room once again, relieved to notice that the daily visitors hadn't arrived yet. He casually checked his watch and calculated that, if work didn't interfere, the group he had come to call "the first squad" would be here at 1 p.m. for lunch break. Consequently, it meant he still had a bit more than an hour alone before the others' arrival forced him to step back in the background not to disturb them and their limited time with their boss and friend.

Shin shook his head sadly. This was one of the many ironies of life he would have preferred not experiencing. A few years ago, he wouldn't have been this silent shadow haunting the corridors of the hospital and disappearing, hiding in a corner or a doorframe whenever the _others_ walked in to visit Jack. A few years ago, he would have felt free to keep his vigil at his friend's bedside even when the others walked in. But this was before. Before the fight. Before they stopped talking to each other. The lonely figure almost swore aloud as the now familiar lump formed in his throat. He felt powerless, useless and he hated every moment of it. How could he present himself to these people he never met?

"Hi, I'm an old friend of Jack. Well, we stopped talking to each other three years ago and I learned he had been injured thanks to his ex-wife's phone call."

Not that good.

"Hi, I'm an old friend of Jack. He never talked about me? Normal, last time I saw him, I almost broke his ribs."

Worse.

"Hi, I'm an old friend of Jack. The reason I almost broke his ribs? It's because he tried to explode my nose to teach me to stop calling him a coward and a hypocrite."

Slippery slope, one might say.

"Hi, I'm an old friend of Jack. Why I called him a coward and a hypocrite? Well, because he preferred coming back to the dubious safety of a doomed marriage his tail between his legs than finding the courage to try and be happy for once in his damn life."

Not the best thing to say given the sad and complicated puzzle he was beginning to assemble after a few days of silent, forced observation.

_Something was off._

At first sight, Jack's team, his _second family_ as he once heard him call them with fondness, looked as distressed as one could expect a tight, united team to be. And this was the impression Shin first got as he watched them come and visit their boss. Their haggard eyes reddened by the lack of sleep and unshed tears, their tired, dropping shoulders, the way they put their hands in their pockets or crossed their arms tightly, everything showed their pain and their fear. However, as the days went on, he began to notice _things_, strange attitudes he couldn't analyse.

_Something was off and he couldn't quite put his finger on it. Yet._

There was this Latino guy who seemed to be unable to stay more than a few short minutes in the room, as if its atmosphere asphyxiated him. He would come out quickly, his eyes full of bitter regret, pace along the corridor, whispering to an invisible interlocutor, then walk back in, apparently ready to utter the rehearsed words. In vain. Then there was the Latina girl who didn't know what to do with herself. On the one hand, he could feel she really wanted to be by Jack's side. On the other hand, it was obvious her pain was less sharp than that of the others, but, contrary to the rest of the gang, she was alone to deal with it. The small black woman seemed to spend less time in the hospital than her colleagues but she made the better of the scarce hours she could spend by Jack's side.

Talking to him.

Scolding him.

Promising him hell as soon as he woke up.

Telling him about the day at the office.

About the pain and the fear the team suffered from.

Praying him to wake up soon so they could make up for the time they had stupidly wasted since the Chicago fiasco.

A prayer Shin'ichi knew well because he had repeated the same one daily since Maria's phone call. As tragic as Jack's accident was, it could be the occasion for a brand new start for everyone.

Finally, there were the three last ones. And, if he could identify with the first ones and empathize with their regrets and bitterness, he was just confused by the sad ritual unfolding daily in front of him. Better said, he was beginning to understand the inextricable problem but wasn't ready yet to accept that his friend had really put himself in a deep mess this time.

_Something was off and he was afraid to put his finger on it._

* * *

**_Pittsburgh, February 17th 1975_**

_No more fights. No more hanging out._

You silently clench your fists in your pockets as you keep on walking on the frozen sidewalk and try to ignore the jerk's stupid provocations on your way back from school.

"Jacky boy is walking back straight home?"

You grit your teeth, biting back the sharp reply before it comes out.

"Jacky boy doesn't go out anymore?"

You keep your stubborn silence.

"You lost your tongue or what? You were much more talkative the other day, punk," the idiot goes on, much prouder and more courageous now that he isn't alone to confront you.

"What did he tell you?" one of his friends enquires, already cracking his knuckles.

"That he would make me spit my teeth next time I'd cross his path," Wally Malatesta relates the end of your last encounter and concludes his brief recollection with a comical roll of his big shoulders, conveniently forgetting about the unimportant moment when he found himself thrown headfirst in the dustbin behind the school.

"Oh, yeah?" the choir of idiots comments before trying to encircle you and block your path, an overconfident smile plastered on their faces.

_No more fights. No more hanging out._

Swallowing your pride, you calmly reach an intersection and silently wait for the green light while the circle of idiots narrows slowly around you.

_No more fights. It was a promise._

Two weeks ago, you would have fought back without a second of hesitation.

Ten days ago, you would have beaten their asses without any remorse.

Eight days ago, you wouldn't have feared the principal's wrath and put an end to their provocations the very moment it had begun during gym class.

However, one night, seven days ago, your quiet little world collapsed as you discovered the extent of the sad truth, and you made this promise in your silent bedroom just after your distraught mother left it. No, you wouldn't tell your father, even if the need, the urge to make the call to the Philippines is harder and harder to fight against every night. But you'll make everything in your power to stop _her _from going on hurting herself.

So, the day after, you cut your growing hair she wasn't fond of just to please her and make her smile. She didn't notice the change until two days ago but her timid appreciation that morning was worth the wait.

So, you confiscated the keys of the car, put away the meds, hid the knives of the kitchen and ignored her indignation.

"Stop treating me like a child!" she yelled.

"_You _are acting like a child!" you spat back before giving her the medication her doctor prescribed, the only way to be sure she was taking it.

So, you became paranoid and began to run back straight home instead of hanging out after school. You decided to stop anything you used to do that could worry her and tried to avoid brawls instead of rushing into them head first.

_No more fights, it was a promise._

That was why you have stubbornly ignored Malatesta's provocations since you walked out of school, silently hoping the jerk would get bored before you lost your fragile temper. That was why you are stuck at this intersection, surrounded by idiots who don't know when to shut their mouth. Finally, the green light appears and you barely mask the tiny, amused smile on your lips. Sure, you can't beat their ass, you made the promise. But it doesn't mean you can't teach them one thing or two.

Without any warning you push your way through the small crowd and begin to run across the frozen road. Surprised by this sudden movement, Malatesta and his guys try and run after you, forgetting about the black ice and the short green light. Once you reach the other sidewalk, you can hear the angry horns and you take a look behind you to discover a bunch of idiots sprawled on the road blocking the traffic. The tiny smile on your lips becomes a wider, satisfied one.

Your grandfather is right, there's nothing like rosin on the soles of your shoes on winter days.

And you resume your walk back home, thinking about the meal you're going to cook tonight and imagining new stratagems to convince _her_ to start eating properly again.

* * *

_**Monday, October 23rd, 2006**_

_Ten fucking days._

Ten days had gone by since the shooting and Dr. Thomas still wanted to wait for a few days more and observe the evolution of the haematoma because it had spread out a bit more than he would have been satisfied with. A least, this was the explanation Shin'ichi finally got when he had cornered the head nurse and pressed her to give him something more precise and accurate than the medically correct and infuriating "Mr. Malone is doing all right".

In a nutshell, more than a week had gone by and Jack wasn't out of the woods yet.

_Ten fucking days!_

The frustrated man almost slammed the door shut on his way out the nurse station but remembered just in time where he actually was. However, his brief spark of realization didn't prevent him from jostling the frail, blonde woman who heavily walked out his friend's room. Ashamed by his lack of consideration, he reached for her arm instinctively to help her regain her footing.

"_Gomen_… I'm sorry, Miss," Shin stuttered, mixing English and Japanese, another sign he was getting really tired. "Are you…" he began to ask but was unable to go on with his question as he became aware of her state of exhaustion. He didn't know what hit him more, the dark circles underlying her eyes, the thinness of her arm or her absent stare.

_Poor girl._

"You all right?" he finally asked after an awkward silence.

"Yeah, thank you, sir," she absently answered and resumed her walk.

Shin let her go and watched her walk away with sad, sympathetic eyes. It was only when the revolving door of the hall closed behind her that he realized she hadn't even questioned his presence around Jack's room.

* * *

**_Pittsburgh, May 19th 1975_**

_Fuck…_

The mere atmosphere of the house is suffocating, and all the traces of her former presence are the painful reminders of your failure, of your uselessness.

_Your uselessness._

Your father has told you so by accusing you of not having been able to watch your mother like you have been told, as soon as the confused, grieving man has stepped into the darkened, silent house. Of course you had spat back and reproached him his absence, his stubbornness, his blindness, your voice full of venom.

_Fuck…_

And here you are a day later, a few hours after the funerals, stubbornly defying the cold outside for fear of what you're going to find _inside_.

_Her _chair by the window in the living room. She liked to sit here at the end of the day.

_Her _coat and scarf still hanging by the main door.

The crossword puzzle on the kitchen table _she_'ll never finish because _she _has decided she was done with life.

Because she has decided that a son, a husband and a loving family weren't enough to balance the aching, constant, irrational pain.

_Fuck…_

As much as you want to cry, to shout your throat hoarse, your eyes remain desperately dry and the damn knot in your stomach isn't going anywhere.

_Fuck…_

Your hands are so cold that your knuckles have taken this typical blue coloration and you can't help the regular shudders from running through your chilled body. But you won't come in.

You can't come in and confront _him_.

You can't walk in and see your reflection in his pained features and lost stare.

You simply can't.

So you're staying outside in the freezing cold because both of you are too bitter and hurt and stubborn and proud to lean on each other.

_Fuck…_

* * *

_**Thursday, 26th October, 2006**_

"So, you're saying you're letting him wake up?" Anne's voice was trembling as she asked again, fearful she had misunderstood the doctor's statement.

"Yes," Dr. Thomas repeats patiently. "The evolution during the last two days has been very satisfying and I can't see any reason to maintain Mr. Malone in this state."

Not bothering to stay and listen to the doctor explaining how they were going to get Jack out of his comatose state to a relieved and hopeful Anne, Shin'ichi rushed out of the building to make the phone call the girls were anxiously waiting for in Chicago.

_At last._

He was so excited his thumb had a hard time finding the right buttons.

_At last._

He was sure he was grinning like an idiot. And maybe his eyes were a bit shiny too.

_At last._

"Good news at last?" a timid, hopeful voice interrupted him and he brusquely looked up to discover the young woman's tired features and the hesitant smile on her lips.

_Busted_.

He was busted and it was almost a relief. At least with the girl, he could drop the ghost costume.

Still grinning like a fool, Shin only nodded.

"Yeah."

The smile formed on her lips more firmly and reached her eyes as she let out a long, deep, almost shaky breath.

"Thanks," she whispered and resumed her walk to the building.

"But you might want wait for a minute or two before going up," he began to warn Samantha, whose smile vanished almost at once at the hesitant, careful sound of his voice. "Y'know, _she _is there, too," he mumbled, indicating the building with an embarrassed movement of his head.

"I can wait with you, if you want," he proposed quickly, witnessing the sudden sadness and powerlessness washing over her, darkening her face.

The young woman fixed her eyes on him, still trying to gauge the polite stranger in front of her. Finally, she nodded, the smile reappearing on her lips, and held out her hand.

"I'm Samantha."

The man answered her gesture in kind.

"I'm Shin."

* * *

**_Pittsburgh, July 16th 1984._**

_Idiot!_

Would have it been so difficult to swallow your damn pride for once in your life and call a cab?

You knew you weren't in any condition to drive all the way to the physical therapy centre. The meds for the pain in your knee that make you sleep most of the day, the exhausting exercises you're repeating day after day to be able to walk properly again: those were as many reasons that should have prevented you to take your damn car.

But you did it.

And you fell asleep.

And, if the harsh, metallic sound of the car rushing out of the road hadn't torn you away from your medicated slumber, you wouldn't be there anymore to blame yourself again and again in that damn hospital bed.

_Fucking idiot!_

Since the accident back in February, you've found yourself stuck in that downward spiral, unable or unwilling even to make the necessary effort to break it, to get out of it. On the contrary, you've been applying yourself to accentuate the movement, to speed it up even.

You came back _home_, pretending the rent was cheap. But, honestly, you still don't know which evil spirit had driven you there. You could have flown to Okinawa as Shin had proposed to you; there, the rent would have been cheap too, and the company much more pleasant than your damn TV screen. However, this same company would have forced you to wake up from your torpor, would have compelled you to be honest with yourself.

They would have made you recognize the accident wasn't the real problem.

And _this _was something you weren't ready to confront. You don't know if you're ready now, but you're stuck one more time in a hospital bed and you've got nothing better to do apart from getting angry at yourself and fearing your grandfather's visit.

_Fucking, damn idiot!_

You didn't like the Army but it was all you had. Moreover, years after years of training and education, you had finally learned to valuate your imposed family.

Your only family, whether you appreciated it or not.

And, one night back in October, on a small Caribbean island, you committed the worst sin possible for a soldier.

You wondered: "Why?"

So, you began to doubt your family and its legitimacy. At first, a bottle of vodka had helped to push the creeping, cold beast away. However, it kept insisting, taking advantage of your moments of inattention or weakness, always repeating the same question. Why? You had accepted to embrace the family career because, deep inside, you had this same desire to protect your people as your father. However, that night in Saint-George's, you couldn't shake the impression you hadn't really protected anyone, on the contrary.

And everything had spiralled downward since then.

You had doubted your only family and weren't able to stand it anymore. The training accident had just hastened an inevitable outcome. The flip side of the coin was you had persuaded yourself you had nothing left.

You convinced yourself that you were all alone, in spite of all the contradicting signs, that you deserved your loneliness.

And this idea hurt like hell.

* * *

_**Friday, October 27th, 2006**_

The waking process, for some reason, had been longer than expected. In itself, this new development was worrying, and Dr. Thomas had a hard time hiding his own worries. Exhausted, Anne had finally given up her anxious vigil and listened to the nurse who had sent her back home for the night. As for them, they had been sent away at the end of visiting hours, not without extorting the permission to come back in the early morning to check on Jack. These had been the tiresome, frustrating events of the day before.

And here they were a few hours later, he, the former best friend, and she, the former mistress, sitting next to his bed, waiting, hoping for some reassuring sign, for any reassuring sign.

Something wasn't right, it was what his instincts kept on telling him, and they were rarely wrong. It was purely irrational, but this bad feeling had plagued Shin'ichi since he had woken up from his light slumber in the early hours of the morning. However, as irrational and stupid as it was, he was condemned to fight it on his own for he didn't want to add useless worries on the sleeping woman's already fragile shoulders.

And the damn waiting went on…

TBC...


	5. Who am I? part one

And here is a new chapter… Incredible but true. However, I can't promise the next one will be written this fast

So, once again, many many thanks to Diane who is a great beta and support, and many others to those who bear with me and my slow writing (as I'm can be quite oblivious, don't hesitate and feel free to "nag" me, as a great Kiwi wrote me this week).

Disclaimers : I don't own anything.

Nuff' said, on with the fic!

**CHAPTER TWO: WHO AM I?**

**Part one: Lost Puppy**

_**Friday, October 27th, 2006**_

You deserved your loneliness. You came to this conclusion many years ago and, since then, all your life had been shaped by this one terrible, definitive sentence, whether you tried to rebel against it or accepted it passively. Indeed, _this _was what all your life had been about, the refusal or the acceptation of your situation, of what you came to consider as your fate. Of course, since you've always been a fighter, you spent much more time and energy struggling against it than accepting it. However, there always had been a flip side to the coin: each time, the intense, overwhelming pain of the moment of acceptance had been proportional to the efforts you made while fighting.

The stupid car accident had been a real wake-up call and you had reacted at last, after months of apathy. After having completed your rehabilitation, you took advantage of the generous pension the Army had given you and began to study psychology and anthropology at Penn State. Whether you liked it or not, you were still a boy from Pennsylvania, and they had a good rugby team. There, you developed your instinct, your capacity to feel people, a capacity largely underused during your time in the Army. Moreover, even if it hadn't been your main motivation, you almost understood what must have happened in your mother's head and the bitter feeling of failure gave way to the duller one of helplessness. Finally, you enjoyed playing as much as your knee let you and found another makeshift family among the guys who just wanted to have fun and not to be bothered by the pressure omnipresent in the more popular sports. Then you found a career you enjoyed and in which you could express yourself completely. You left Pennsylvania for good and discovered a place where you wanted to stay in spite of all its flaws. You also met a stunning and smart and ambitious young lawyer, and, under her spell, encouraged by the way your career was evolving, you persuaded yourself you could build your own family.

You became convinced that even you had the right to be happy.

And you had been happy, more than that, even.

For a while…

* * *

The growing pain in her neck caused by her awkward position woke Samantha up. Standing up to stretch her aching spine, she sleepily consulted her watch and winced.

8 a.m.

It was 8 in the morning already and Jack still hadn't even stirred, which meant she would have to go to work without any reassuring news, which meant he would probably wake up later when she couldn't be by his side. The weary woman sighed sadly. She couldn't explain why but it was so important for her to be there when he would first open his eyes. Of course, it wouldn't change anything, Anne would still be there. However, she needed to see him wake up with her own eyes, maybe to reassure her, maybe to be able to say how sorry she was she hadn't noticed the boy sooner, maybe to be able to say what was in her heart, Anne be damned. But it was 8 in the morning and she had to leave the hospital to go to work. Sadly, she gathered her belongings, careful not to disturb Shin's rest, and, staring one last time at the motionless figure in the bed, she silently left the room.

One hour later, Samantha walked into the bullpen, holding a much needed steaming cup of coffee.

"Any news?" Danny asked anxiously as soon as she sat down at her desk.

The young woman took a deep, steadying breath before answering with a light, incontrollable quavering in her voice: "Nothing yet."

"Damn!" her colleague swore between gritted teeth and brusquely stood up, obviously unable to contain his anxiety any more.

"What's the doctor saying about that?" he finally enquired.

Samantha shrugged in a tired, helpless gesture.

"Not much. Not the most common evolution. Not the most unusual either. The usual bullshit, y'know."

"In other words, they quite don't know what's happening, do they?" Vivian reformulated with sad, ironic smirk.

"Something like that, yeah," the younger agent acquiesced and turned back to her desk, deciding to concentrate on the work at hand, the only way to hide her own growing fears.

* * *

_You screwed up._

Yes, you've been happy for a while. More than that, even.

Nonetheless, the moment came when you began to take everything for granted, the girls, your marriage, and you started to spend more time chasing after elusive ghosts, convinced that _your family _would always wait for you.

As if your scarce presence at home were enough for them…

As if not admitting your job was eating you little by little were enough to hide the fact you were slowly becoming a shell of your former self.

At last, quite predictably, Maria didn't even stir when you walked into the bedroom late at night, and you knew nothing would ever be the same.

Of course, for a while, you tried to fight the evidence, because it's engraved in your genes. Jack Malone doesn't give up, ever.

_You screwed up._

You accepted Maria's incessant recriminations, just for the sake of keeping an intact _family_.

You made a habit of staying late at work just to escape from the inevitable, exhausting fights.

You tried to take your collapsing family to nice holiday trips as a way to seek forgiveness and strengthen the loosening ties for a few weeks more. This way, life at home was a bit more bearable before the fights and the tension made their reappearance.

You stayed at work even more.

And before you knew it, you fell in love for the first time in your life.

_You screwed up._

However, you were so obsessed by the idea of patching things up you let everybody call the best thing that ever happened in your sorry life a fling, a midlife crisis, to the point you convinced yourself it was all that Samantha had been.

A fling.

A midlife crisis.

_This_ was what _they_ kept on repeating or thinking. Maria, Anne, Vivian, Danny, Martin…

An understanding companion.

A future.

_This _was what she had once represented for you.

The possibilities she offered you were so frightening that you let her down to come back to the safety of your sorry life.

_You screwed up._

Shin was right. A coward, this was all you've been for the past few years. So stubborn and cowardly, you persisted in fighting the wrong fights, digging yourself into a deeper and deeper hole.

_You screwed up._

* * *

_Bad day…_

Almost running rather unceremoniously across the main hall of the FBI building, Martin succeeded in rushing into the closing elevator. He had decided to pay Jack a visit before going to work but all the traffic gods allied against him. First, he had been forced to turn around the hospital for twenty minutes before finding a parking slot. Then, on his way to work, he had to struggle to find a way to by-pass the mess provoked by some moron who thought not respecting a red light was a good idea when it was pouring. Ignoring the shocked stares addressed to the Deputy Director's son and his incorrect behaviour, the young agent snorted at the idea that possessed him and pushed him to take his car instead of using the subway. He thought he could buy himself more time at the hospital, and, as a result, he was more than an hour late.

_Bad day…_

Meanwhile, he had been able to see Jack and notice nothing had changed since the day before. Unfortunately, he hadn't been able to catch a nurse to get some explanation, and, because of his lateness, he had missed Samantha. He knew she would be there, of course. The growing signs of exhaustion on her face and her stubborn silence really worried him and he had thought that meeting her at the hospital would help him to try and reach her, to try and make her confide herself, even if that meant he had to listen to rather unpleasant confidences. Instead, he had noticed the Asian guy who haunted the corridors nearby Jack's room was still there, and even worse, was fast asleep at Jack's bedside. This was some mystery he needed to solve, and quickly.

_Bad day…_

The elevator finally reached his unit floor and he rushed out of it and walked straight into the bullpen, anxious to check on Samantha. His friend was sitting at her desk, apparently working on some telephone records. Relieved to see that she seemed to hold on in spite of the lack of evolution of Jack's condition, Martin went to his own desk, answering Danny's silent question with a sad shake of his head.

"Considering your sour face, I take it nothing had changed yet," he heard Vivian asking him as she came back to the bullpen a few minutes later.

"Indeed, nothing new," he replied softly, discretely gauging Samantha's reaction.

But the young woman remained unmoved, her attentive features betraying no emotion.

After a few seconds of awkward silence, Vivian spoke again, trying to be reassuring in spite of her own fears.

"Since it's a slow day for the moment, Danny and I decided to go to the hospital for lunch break. Hopefully, we will have some good news at last."

"By the way, while you're here, you might want to check on this Asian guy I talked about before," Martin added without really thinking about it, finally giving voice to his nagging, irrational worries. "He's always there but didn't introduce himself…"

"He's Jack's childhood friend, don't fret," Samantha cut him while going on with the study of her phone records.

"And you know that how?" Danny, who had remained silent until then, asked wearily. He had also noticed the guy and had shared his impressions with Martin a few days before.

_Bad day…_

Vivian and Elena looked up from their desks and studied the tense exchange. Really, this damn waiting was getting on everyone's nerves. Until the moment Dr. Thomas had announced they were letting Jack wake up, the team had stuck together. However, as the waking process continued and the feeling of helplessness grew, the tensions within the team had increased dramatically this morning.

"Jack told me about him and showed me photos," the blonde agent answered curtly, too tired or oblivious to notice the impact or the deeper meaning of her few words.

Martin winced at the short evocation. In spite of Danny's sympathetic stare and silent support, hearing stuff like this hurt like hell.

_A fling._

That was what she had told him two years ago to placate his worries.

_A fling, my ass._

_He never had a chance._

_Jack had always been the one._

Martin almost swore between his clenched teeth.

Whether he wanted or not, Anne be damned, Jack Malone would have to face his responsibilities as soon as he would wake up.

That was the least Martin could do for Samantha.

* * *

_Wrong choices._

As hard as you try, it's almost impossible to pinpoint the exact moment when everything snowballed into this downward spiral.

The first time Samantha walked into your office?

The evening Maria threw you out of the apartment because she had "discovered everything"?

The day you said "it's over" to Samantha?

The Mashburn incident?

The moment you agreed to leave everything you had built and everyone you had cared about to go to Chicago?

The horrendous day spent answering Scoggins' questions?

_More wrong choices._

However, there's one thing you're sure about: during the past few years, you kept on fighting the wrong battles again and again.

You let Samantha down to try and _save _your family just to prove Maria she was wrong, just to prove yourself you weren't your _father_.

You accepted to go to Chicago, then watched the woman you had risked your life for move on with another man, fighting a constant inner battle not to tell her what you really felt or thought, convincing yourself it was the right thing to do, that, after all, you deserved your loneliness.

You acted on impulse and kissed Anne, just because you were so tired of being lonely.

You fought to maintain this awkward relationship just because you wanted to prove Maria and Scoggins they were wrong, that you weren't condemned to stay all alone.

_More and more wrong choices._

And, in the process, you forgot what or whom you really cared about.

Sometimes, you wish you could erase all those mistakes and wrong turns in your life like one cleans a blackboard. However, that's impossible and you're getting tired of always trying to right the wrong, and causing more wrong in the process. Actually, you're fed up of being a coward and acting like you're expected to and not like you deeply want to. But _this _is something that requires much more courage than you showed until then, if you don't count your spontaneous move during the Mashburn incident, when you came after who you really wanted for once in your life. In a nutshell, you want to change and you're afraid to do so at the same time.

_You're afraid of making more wrong choices._

Finally, slumber is a good place to stay.

* * *

The entire work day had gone by relatively smoothly. Vivian and Danny had paid a visit to the hospital for lunch break, noticed Jack hadn't woken up yet and had met a more and more distraught Anne, but saw no sign of the "Asian guy". Samantha almost smiled at the thought. During their long discussion around coffee and burgers the evening before, she had kind of guessed Shin wasn't a big fan of Anne. At least, what she had told him about the rather conflicting beginnings of this new relationship hadn't improved his perception of her character. As a consequence, it wasn't such a big surprise to hear he had made himself scarce while Anne had stayed at Jack's bedside.

Almost on autopilot, she parked her car and walked straight to the intensive care unit, a path she knew by heart now. Following her newfound ritual since the shooting, she made a first stop at the vending machine in the main hall and grabbed some chocolate bars. Then, she went to the nurse station and asked about Jack's condition. Finally, not having heard what she ached to hear, she got to the room and found a now familiar silhouette.

"Hi there," Shin whispered. "Had a good day?"

"Hi back," Samantha answered with a light smile. She couldn't say why, maybe it was because of this big brother aura of his, but she really liked him. "Probably better than yours."

"Why?"

"Because I had a wonderful diversion. Phonecall records," she deadpanned. Bitter humour was her last weapon against the growing fears.

"Indeed…" he replied simply, his face serious.

"You okay? Anything wrong?" the young woman asked, suddenly alarmed by his melancholy.

"Not really," he answered softly, turning his cup of coffee in his hands. "I just had to talk to the girls this afternoon, that's all…"

_Just wanna sleep…_

Little by little, second by second, despite all the efforts you're making to stay in the comforting dullness of slumber, you become more aware of your surroundings. The first thing you notice is the bed: it's as uncomfortable as the last time you were stuck in a hospital. Not wanting to face the world yet, you try to settle your numb body on the hard mattress and go back to sleep. However, the repeating sound of the machines nearby doesn't allow you this privilege and contributes to tear the fog further apart.

_Leave me alone…_

A few seconds more and the damn sound isn't the only thing reaching your ears anymore. People are talking next to you. If you didn't have this tube stuck in your throat, you'd tell them to go to hell and let you sleep. But you have this tube in your throat and getting rid of it would mean moving your arm to do so, and, as a consequence, walking farther down the road to consciousness.

And _this _is what you want to avoid at all cost.

Because consciousness means demons to fight, old ones as well as newer ones.

Because consciousness means guilt and regrets, guilt about what you did and regrets about what you didn't do.

Because everything is much simpler and easier when you're doing nothing but staying in the darkness of slumber.

Because with darkness and slumber always come the sweet comfort of oblivion.

_Just wanna sleep…_

_And they won't let you…_

Whispering softly, making themselves as discreet as possible not to give the nurses an occasion to kick them out, they went on with their conversation for almost half an hour. Sad topics were quickly forgotten and replaced by safer, lighter ones.

The funny cases.

The idiosyncrasies of the administration.

Jack's bad temper.

Past good times

Shin'ichi quietly related one of their pranks in Junior High and instinctively gave a mischievous look at his friend when he reached the moment when they had been nose to nose with a less than pleased Goto-sensei. Stopping mid-speech, his eyes wide, he got up to check the monitors.

_Something was different._

"What's up?" Samantha asked with a worried voice, fighting the feeling of hope that had suddenly made its reappearance.

"I think his pulse has sped up. Stay here, I'm calling a nurse," he simply commented and stormed out of the room.

Meanwhile, the young woman drew her chair closer to the bedside and, gathering her courage, took his hand for the first time in years. Her breath caught in her throat, she watched his eyelids moving so slightly, as if refusing to open up.

And, finally, the silent wish she had formulated days before was granted. She saw him open his eyes, close them almost immediately then open them once again.

_He was awake, at last. _

The feeling of relief was so overwhelming she didn't notice the silent, enquiring stare at once, the tensing of the hand between hers. A few more seconds went by before she was able to distinguish his face through her tears.

It was then she noticed it, at last.

This blank stare.

This stare without any spark of recognition.

When Shin came back to the room with the head nurse no more than five minutes later, the first thing he saw was Jack slightly turning his head at the sound of their footstep and relief washed over him. Then, he met his friend's eyes and his throat constricted. Finally, he took in Samantha's distraught expression that confirmed the bad feeling that had haunted him since the early morning.

_Not funny, aniki._

_That's not funny at all._


	6. Who am I? part two

So, after a few months of silence, here's another chapter…

Don't worry, I may be a slow, extremely slow writer, but I have a wonderful beta who knows how to call me back to my duties. It'll take time, but I'll finish this, you can be sure.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything besides the first two seasons DVDs.

Now, on with the story…

**CHAPTER TWO: WHO AM I?**

**Part two: Fall out**

_**Sunday, October 30th, 2007**_

_The girls were so beautiful._

The problem was that meeting them was almost more frightening than reassuring. Of course, the way they had rushed to his bedside in spite of their mother's instructions had made a wave of sweet, warm feeling surge in him, and his arms had closed around his sobbing daughters instinctively. However, as soon as his hands had made their way to the trembling shoulders, the same disturbing question that had haunted him each time a new sad face walked into his room came back and harassed his mind.

Were these feelings the girls had awakened in him the result of some deep connection or merely an empathetic reaction to their visible distress?

He just didn't know all these people. As hard as he struggled to remember something, _anything, _they were perfect strangers to him. Yet, their ill-concealed pain and sadness had touched him, repeatedly for the last two days.

The despair in the blonde woman's eyes had hurt him deeply, and he even didn't know why.

The profound disbelief that appeared on the Asian guy's face as soon as he had rushed into the room had made him want to smile reassuringly as if his amnesia was nothing at all.

_Just a scratch, just as kids say before running back to their bike._

Then, more people had come and visited him, and he hadn't remembered anything about them.

It was frightening.

He didn't know any of them, he didn't know himself, and he had to rely on what _they _were telling him.

Could he trust them? Were they telling him the truth about who he was, about who they were? Were their sad faces genuine? On the contrary, wasn't he surrounded by lies?

Was he condemned to hitting this white wall again and again whenever he tried to recollect a fugitive moment he could associate with the person in front of him?

It was frightening and exhausting.

_The girls were beautiful._

No, he corrected in his mind. _His _girls were beautiful. That was what the doctor had told him two day ago when he had first woken up.

His name was Jack Malone.

He was born in 1959 and worked for the FBI as the supervisor of the missing persons unit.

Both his parents were deceased.

He had been married, then got divorced.

Apparently, he had moved on since his girlfriend Anne was a constant, sad presence at his bedside.

And, last but not least, he was the father of two daughters, Hannah and Kate. Jack unconsciously held them closer as he recited this particular line of his short background in his mind. He was profoundly ashamed he couldn't remember them, but holding them like that, their faces buried in each side of his neck, was his way to ignore the failure of his memory.

_Just for a moment._

He couldn't remember a single detail about his daughters. He didn't know what their favourite colours were or when were their birthdays. He couldn't picture the moment they walked for the first time or the night their cries announced the arrival of their first teeth. However, deep inside, in his gut, in his heart, in his whole body, there was something warm whispering to him that these crying girls were his flesh and blood beyond any doubt. And, soothed by this reassuring knowledge, for the first time in two days of never-ending inner questioning, he was able to enjoy just holding his girls and letting his mind rest for a little while.

* * *

_Amnesia_

An unnoticed shadow in the corridor, Maria observed the long overdue reunion fugitively. Kate, she noticed immediately, had found her favourite cuddling spot in the crook of her father's left shoulder while Hannah, always more reserved than her sister, just sat at Jack's bedside but wasn't ready to let go of the big hand she was clenching in her smaller ones. For the moment, the girls didn't seem so bothered by their father's condition. Yet, following Shin's advice, she had been forced to tell them about it, to prepare them for the blank stare that was going to welcome them in that hospital room instead of Jack's usually warm, smiling greeting.

Amnesia 

They knew he had forgotten everything about them, but they had chosen to act as if nothing was wrong and rushed to his bedside without a second of hesitation. Was it denial? Or was it that these two girls were much wiser than all the grown-ups surrounding them and knew how to relish the simple fact that their father had woken up at last? Indeed, since she had walked into the building, she had witnessed how much people seemed awkward around Jack.

Anne was devastated, yet stayed at his bedside, staring at him as if she didn't recognize him.

Three members of his team, Danny, Kate's crush, the Deputy Director's son and a woman she didn't recognize, were going out of Jack's room when the girls and she had arrived, commenting sadly about Jack's condition as if it was a terminal illness of some sort.

Vivian Johnson was waiting patiently for the girls to be finished with their father to visit her old friend. Always the rock of the team, her face betrayed no alarm, no defeatism; she had to be strong for everybody else at the office. However, her marked eyes filled with regret and slightly slouched shoulders showed that the situation was taking its toll on her; and her patient waiting could also be interpreted as a sign of reluctance, as if she was a little afraid of what she was going to meet in Jack's room.

A certain blonde woman hadn't even showed up.

_Amnesia_

One more time, Maria took a look at the scene in Jack's bedroom and, finally noticed the concern stubbornly hidden behind the teary smiles and endless chatter. "Definitely, the girls are wiser and stronger than anyone else in this hospital," she mused, hesitating between the pride she felt for her daughters and the anguish that overwhelmed her about what was going to happen next. Not that this particular event had made her realize Jack was her one and only. This kind of crap only happened in the movies.

_In the bad ones._

Nonetheless, she had been the witness of Hannah and Kate's growing frustration. She had seen the fear in their eyes as soon as she had finished her difficult explanation of their father's condition. And she couldn't help but wonder what impact Jack's amnesia could have on their daughters. Maria had betrayed and took advantage of his so many weaknesses because she believed it was the right thing to do to protect the girls. She had been able of the worst machination just for them, and getting a little payback as well. So, what if this incident had long-time repercussions? What if Hannah and Kate had to suffer collateral damages because of the healing process? She couldn't let that happen. Jack wasn't her one and only any more, he hadn't been for years even, but all the bitterness she still felt at times couldn't hide the fact they were the parents of two vulnerable daughters. And she hadn't lied when she had told him as a weak and vain peace offering that the girls needed him. They still did. So, even if she didn't like it, she had to prepare herself to accept anything that could help him to get better.

Even if that meant tolerating this new and rather unwelcome addition to the family that was Anne Cassidy.

Even if, God forbid, that meant allowing a reunion she loathed beyond anything.

Indeed, Maria had to recognize she wasn't that comfortable. To be honest, their last meetings to discuss the organization of the week-ends and vacations hadn't been cordial at all. She hadn't hidden her displeasure at Jack's idea to bring the girls to Okinawa for part of the Christmas holidays; and he hadn't hesitated to fight back for once. She had been surprised by this new attitude.

Jack didn't fight back. That was a fact. From the very beginning of their marriage, it never had been his style.

Jack adjusted most of time until he couldn't take it anymore, then fled away to avoid conflict.

His prior passivity in their marriage, then his growing dedication to his work and his affair were a blatant testimony of that.

His new passivity in his relationship with Anne Cassidy was another testimony.

However, something had changed in him even before the accident. Maybe he hadn't been conscious of it at the time, but it was undeniable.

From this new point of view, his reckless action and his injury weren't that surprising, and Maria didn't like the direction all the evidence was pointing at, she didn't like it at all.

However, if that could help him to defeat his amnesia…

* * *

_**Tuesday, November 2nd, 2007**_

This was a standard evening at the airport. People were running everywhere, anxious to overcome the difficult path that led them to their flight. Extra luggage was one of those ambushes that awaited you and Samantha noticed with an amused smile that Shin finally had obtained his flying card after having had to rush to the other side of the oversized hall to pay for the extra weight in his suitcase.

"Sucks to be a geek, doesn't it?" she welcomed him with a teasing grin. She couldn't believe the guy was flying back to Okinawa with more than 20 pounds of books.

"Tell me about it…" he rolled his eyes. "But it's still a good deal. Importing these books from the US is kinda impossible; it's way too expensive. And I didn't notice I had bought so much until I packed this afternoon, y'know," he explained with a defeated sigh.

"It's true that the nurses at the hospital were calling you the creepy Asiatic bookworm."

"Proves that they never saw somebody really creepy," he deadpanned before offering or rather commanding: "Come on, I'm paying you dinner before I catch my flight, all right?"

And he began to guide Samantha to the nearest impersonal café of the departure hall.

* * *

This was a common evening at the office.

Not an evening of celebration or sad bitterness at the end of a case.

An evening when everything seems still possible and you don't count the sleepless night to come and other sacrifices.

Vivian just had sent Danny and Elena home to grab some sleep before the drop operation they were preparing for later in the night. She was tired, much more than she should have been in similar situations. This was a rather straightforward case of abduction and ransom demand and the kidnappers didn't appear to be the crime geniuses they pretended to be. She shouldn't be that exhausted. This was an operation they could easily manage with only four people, since Samantha had taken the day off before the case even found its way to their office. The woman was the shadow of herself and the acting supervisor hadn't had the heart to call her back, even if she knew she'd never hear the end of it when the younger agent would be back at the office the following day.

Vivian blinked a few times before reading again the page she had just watched without understanding it. Definitely, she had too much on her mind.

_Too much worries._

_Too much intuitions._

She would never admit it, but had she known Samantha was driving Jack's apparently best friend to the airport this evening, she would have called her back. However, even if she didn't approve what she thought was happening, for Samantha's sake and for Jack's sake, she couldn't do anything to prevent it.

She couldn't do it just like she couldn't prevent this sad and resigned expression from invading Martin's face as the weariness of the day was cracking his indifferent mask.

* * *

"So," Shin spoke up when he came back with their sandwiches and drinks, "why didn't you come back to the hospital?"

Samantha cringed at the guy's stubbornness. Not a wonder Jack and he got along so well, they didn't know when to drop a subject.

"I… I don't know," she shrugged. "I just can't…"

"Look at me," her interlocutor commanded softly. "You don't have to feel guilty. You don't. _He_made the choice to protect you. _You_didn't force him to put his life on the line. _He_chose to. That's the kind of guy he is."

"But…"

"No but, please. It's not your fault, damn it," he repeated, his eyes forcing the young woman to look at him. "Besides, the moron kinda likes you, so…" Shin added as if it was common knowledge.

As if he was approving this.

As if he was approving _them_.

But, normally, this wasn't common knowledge, was it? Nobody knew what Jack and she had shared once, right?

Samantha silently gasped as she searched for a confirmation in her companion's eyes. Any kind of confirmation. All she found was friendly acceptance.

But they were a mistake, the symptom of a mid-life crisis, weren't they? Everybody had said it, on more than one occasion. Nobody ever approved them. Ever.

Vivian.

Martin.

Danny.

Maria.

Anne.

Everybody.

However, the man in front of her didn't see a pathetic and weak woman in her. He didn't think of Jack as a forty-something stereotype either. He was trying to understand and support.

Still, he never saw them together, right?

Her inner shock and surprise must have found their way to her face because suddenly Shin was watching her with a warm, brotherly, reassuring expression and took her hand.

"What? You really thought that only the girls talk about these kind of topics on the phone?"


	7. Back in black part one

Well, after a four years hiatus, here is the new chapter of The cheese and the worms... I'm really sorry for the dealy, but my phD kept me busy these past few years.

This is unbetaed and I apologize for all the mistakes...

Usual disclaimer : I don't own anything...

**CHAPTER THREE: BACK IN BLACK**

**Part one: Not that kind of guy**

_**Wednesday, December 27th, 2006**_

The soft but insistent knocking on her door didn't wake Samantha up at first. On the contrary, by adding some concrete material to the dream, the strangely familiar sound plunged her deeper into the unconscious reminiscence.

_A few days after Christmas._

_Years ago, but, at the same time still so vivid…_

_For the first time in almost five years, she had decided to go back to Kenosha for the Christmas vacations and she still didn't know what kind of demon had possessed her when she had phoned home to announce the piece of news. Was it because she had spent enough time in the big city that she felt confident enough to stroll again across the streets of the small town and answer their curious stares with a proud one of her own? Or maybe was it because she didn't want to be anywhere near New York during the holidays, because she didn't want to be anywhere near him. The blind woman in her had wanted to believe that the first explanation had driven to take this sudden and unexpected decision. The brutally honest part of her knew why she had taken her cell phone to impulsively call home just a few minutes after she had witnessed an impromptu family reunion in Jack's office provoked by little Katie's impatient desire to offer her Christmas drawing to her daddy. Nonetheless, the reason why she had found herself sitting between her insufferable, know-it-all brother-in-law and her tired mother, and facing her sister's judging stare on Christmas day wasn't as important as the result of this impulsive decision._

_A disaster._

_A plain disaster._

_If Samantha had needed a reminder why her sister and she had so dramatically drifted apart these past few years, she had founded it just minutes after she had walked through the threshold. She had kissed her mother hello, a warm and unexpected wave of affection submerging her, and put her bags in her old room, smiling fondly at the thought of the man responsible for her new weakness. Then, both the women had taken their seat in the small kitchen, waiting for the tea-kettle to whistle. Of course, her mother had noticed her dreamy smile, but she had just raised an interrogative eyebrow, and for that considerate gesture, Samantha had been grateful. Too many harsh words had been exchanged in the past, and too many words of forgiveness needed to be pronounced before broaching this sensitive topic. _

The soft knocking became louder.

_Samantha and her mother had shared a comfortable silence as they warmed their hands around their steaming mugs when a loud banging on the front door had resounded harshly. _

_Then Patricia, Harry and their two little monsters had stormed into the modest house and the fragile spell had been broken. With a feeling of bitter irony, she had immediately thought of this movie Jack and she had caught on TV the month before, _Home for the Holidays_, and decided the movie was a scientific documentary, with the exception that there wasn't a wonderful, loving gay brother with Robert Downey Jr.'s face to save the day. Patricia and her perfect little family had walked in and all hell had broken loose._

After another three unfruitful attempts, the knocking on the door stopped at last.

_She didn't know who was insisting so much but she wanted them to go away. This had been the worst Christmas holidays of her life and she wasn't ready to face anyone. Knowing deep inside you've made the wrong choices was one thing, but being told the way she had been by her judgemental sister was quite another kind of nightmare. Too proud to reveal her guilty and powerless tears, she had stormed out of the dining room, picked up her bag and run away, stopping just enough to whisper a strangled goodbye to her worried and apologetic mother._

A few minutes, or maybe merely seconds, after the knocking had stopped, the ringing of her cell phone resounded in the silent apartment.

_Samantha reached her cell phone with a frustrated sigh. Couldn't people leave her alone just for a while? She was half tempted to ignore it but it could be Danny calling her for a new case. _

_The text she read made her happy she had let her professional consciousness take the better of her and for the first time in two days, a timid smile formed on her teary face._

Rubbing her eyes sleepily, Samantha rose up from her couch where she had fallen asleep while watching_ Home for the Holidays_ on TV the night before. Obviously, neither Robert Downey Jr. nor the sight of her sister's celluloid avatar attacked by a flying turkey had been enough to keep her awake.

As she began to look for the disturbing cell phone, she noticed the lights were still on and switched them off.

When she finally took hold of her phone, an overwhelming feeling of dejà-vu washed over her. Fighting against the knot in her stomach, she rushed towards her front door on shaky legs and drew it open brutally to reveal Jack's determined posture.

"I'm tired of all this crap," she heard him pronounce slowly. "I wanna know everything. Good. Bad. I don't fucking care. I just wanna know."

The keen and almost disturbing feeling of familiarity vanished into thin air as soon as Samantha's eyes paused on the silhouette in front of her.

_He had changed so much…_

From the way his coat hung less loosely from his previously large shoulders, it looked as if he had gained a few pounds back since she had last seen him three weeks ago before his departure to Chicago, but it wasn't enough yet to erase the painful evidence of the now more than two-months-old accident. Short silver hair was replacing the nude skin of the scar on his temple, covering it and enhancing it at the same time. His face was thinner too, and the past, soft roundness had given place to new wrinkles.

_He had changed so much…_

However, the most considerable change wasn't in his appearance. Of course, the silver hair would stay permanently as a constant reminder of this fateful day, but strength could be recovered, tired features could turn round and soft again. No, the most important change wasn't physical. Samantha had first felt it when she had quickly, cowardly almost, visited him at the hospital after he had woken up, and she had the vivid confirmation looking at her from the door frame. Indeed, what had changed most was his stare, the expression of his eyes. Gone were the lingering regrets that used to haunt them. Gone were the endless compassion and visible guilt. Gone were the spark of passion and the tentative sweetness. Everything that made his stare so special had vanished probably at the same time his memories had fled from his mind.

_He had changed so much and she couldn't help to feel responsible…_

Instead, something hard had taken residence in his eyes along with some strange spark she couldn't quite define yet. His hands firmly buried in the pockets of a navy coat, his ears and unshaved cheeks reddened by the cold air outside, he was looking steadily at her, a hint of challenge in his eyes. He had never gazed at her this way. The young woman couldn't remember him looking at anyone close to him this way. Of course, she had watched him defy suspects, uncooperative witnesses and even fellow policemen or federal agents. She had always assumed it was some kind of persona he had created for the job.

Obviously, she had been wrong, at least partially.

A curious, raised eyebrow as he tilted his head on the side in silent interrogation made her realise she hadn't given him any answer yet. What could she reply to such a sudden, unexpected inquiry? Unable to find a satisfying solution, Samantha settled with answering with a question of her own, the oldest way to buy recovery time in a difficult discussion.

"Hello to you, too, Mr. Malone, and Merry Christmas," she was happy she was able to control the threatening quivering in her voice. "Why on earth do you think I have something to tell?"

The young woman realised that the passive aggressive option wasn't the best one as his stare became more piercing and challenging. The man was on a mission and nothing would prevent him from reaching his goal. Now, she knew what the suspects felt during the tensed interrogations, and it wasn't a good impression.

"Why were you there when I woke up? Why didn't you come back until my last day at the hospital? Why do you look as if you haven't slept for days?" he countered back calmly, his low, calm voice the perfect counterpoint to his challenging eyes.

Taken aback by the unexpected tirade, Samantha could only watch him silently as he went on, his contained anger beginning to put his self control to the test.

"Whenever I ask a question about you, the only explanation I get is that I had the typical mid-life crisis and that I screwed you and my family in the process," he went on harshly, barely controlling the trembling in his voice. Obviously, his stay in Chicago hadn't been as restful as it should have been.

"Jack, I…" she couldn't force the words out of her throat. Did she have the right to tell him the truth and threaten his fragile equilibrium with Anne and his family? Could she let him believe that their history could be resumed like this?

"Am I that kind of guy?" he pressed further. "Am I really that kind of guy, _Sam_? Because I don't feel like I could do something like that."

The sudden use of her nickname almost dissolved her fragile resolve. Unaware of her internal conflict, of the turmoil his words triggered in her, Jack went on, almost pleading :

"If I hurt you, I want to know. If I acted like a bastard, I want to know." He paused for a few seconds, as if collecting his thoughts. "If it was different from what everybody is saying, I want to know."

They stared at each other for a long moment, gauging each other like two opponents, trying to decipher what was happening in the other's mind.

His challenging eyes expressed his need to know, to rediscover himself whatever it took.

Her tired features showed the conflict that had plagued her since the accident.

He trusted her.

She was tired of being afraid.

Finally, Samantha took a deep breath before pulling her door wide open with a shameful but hopeful smile.

"Come in."

* * *

_And back in the big city one more time…_

For the second time in two months, Miyabe Shin'ichi was going through the motions of the rather strenuous process of entry in US territory. The queue was the same, endless and exhausting after the long trip from Japan. The bits of information were as confusing as before. Jeez! He would kill just to be able to lie down for a bit, a little bit. However, one major detail was different, as his conversation with the Security Officer underlined it.

"Business or private travel?" the bored man asked routinely.

"Personal," he had answered then, barely controlling the shaking in his hands. "Official business," he replied now, calm and composed as he produced his police ID and his order of mission. One of his men was on a dangerous undercover work, following the movements of an Okinawa based gang which had recently spread its wing to the US. Thanks to Samantha, he had learnt that the FBI was on his trail for God knows what reason and he had caught the first flight to New York in order to do some damage control… He absolutely could not let some overzealous Yankees sabotage a five years long investigation. Morita's place was behind bars and nowhere else: the _baka_ who would lead the Kita Junior High gang had evolved into a sadistic bastard who dealt in prostitution and human trafficking. As chief of the Coast Guards in Nara, he had come across Morita's damn boats too many times to count without being able to link them to the fucking Yak. This investigation in New York was his big chance, and the FBI team would have to understand this.

Of course, the fact he could use this opportunity to kick J-kun's ass as well was only an added bonus…

Moreover, Jack hated Morita's guts and maybe this could trigger some memories…

* * *

Shin lit a cigarette as he went out the terminal, carefully planning his next moves. Get some sleep. Go to the FBI Office and present himself formally at last. Have some words with Samantha – the girl sounded really distraught on the phone. Finally, have some words with Jack. This was an interesting program, indeed.

Martin was stuck at the office, finishing his report on the latest case. Oh! It wasn't such a difficult report to write… The case had been straightforward and had met a happy resolution. However, for some reason, he didn't seem able to write a single, coherent sentence… The agent sighed as he stretched in his chair, attempting to gain some focus and finish the damn report.

_It was useless._

No amount of concentration seemed to be enough, and his mind kept wandering to his earlier conversation with Jack. Obviously desperate to find some sense of familiarity, his boss had paid a visit to the office today. If the team had been quite relieved to witness his physical progress – a few weeks more, and the incident would be just a bad memory. Nonetheless, the lack of progress on the memory front was quite worrying.

What would Jack do without his memories?

How could he ever go back to work?

Two years ago, before the failure of his relationship with Samantha, before the shooting, before the addiction, Martin would have insisted vehemently that the team could do without Jack Malone, on the professional front, of course, and, more selfishly, on the personal front. Now, older, wiser, the young Fitzgerald could understand and recognize the visceral importance of their boss. Nobody else knew how to twist the regulations without going too far: Danny was too wild, Vivian too "by the book", Elena too "green", and Samantha… Well, Samantha was lost without her best partner, the one who understood her reasoning like nobody else, on the field, at the office. This, and the sudden realization that the _fling_ had been anything but that, had motivated his private conversation with Jack. Seeing the man so lost, witnessing the effects on Samantha had pushed him over the edge…

"_What do you mean, Martin?" his boss asked, utterly confused by the agent's allusions._

"_Well, you know, you got hurt protecting her, and she had quite a hard time lately… It would be a good thing to pay a visit, showing your healthy face…"_

_For a few seconds, Jack's lost stare became more focused, not that different from the patented _Jack Malone stare. _Martin almost smiled at this reassuring sight._

"_It's not the whole story, isn't it?" Jack commented, fixing the younger man with dubious eyes._

"_Let's say she's the only one to know the whole story, if you care to hear it…"_

* * *

Jack finished his coffee, not knowing how to break the heavy silence that had settled in Samantha's apartment.

"Well," he whispered at last with a sad smile. "I'm quite surprised you didn't throw me out yet…"

"I'm not rotten to the point I'd leave an amnesic freeze in the streets," she replied back, relieved to see that Jack hadn't lost his sense of self-deprecation. In spite of the amnesia, he was still Jack Malone…

"Yeah, thanks for that…" In spite of the awkward situation and more awkward conversation, he felt a strange sense of comfort for the first time in two months.

Several minutes flew by, and neither of them wanted to break the silence. Samantha couldn't help but think about all the evenings they had spent in similar comfortable silence, doing crosswords, watching TV… However, that was then, and this was now, and she had speak, even if she loathed the very idea.

"Jack?"

"Yes?"

"I really don't want to throw you out, but shouldn't you go home, now?"

"Well, an empty flat doesn't seem that appealing, y'know…" he sighed, playing with the cup he suddenly found fascinating. "Anne and I decided to go our separate ways," he explained. "Too much pressure, too many complications…"

He put the cup on the table and got up nonetheless. "But you're right. I shouldn't bother you anymore on a week night."

He almost reached the door when Samantha finally digested this new piece of information and reacted, getting up as well.

"I won't let you freeze in an empty apartment. You take the couch."

Her tone didn't let any room for discussion.


	8. Back in black part two

****So, unbelievable but true, here's a second update to this fic in less than four years, in less than a year even... My super speedy beta DianeM is back, so this chapter is much more presentable thanks to her.

Many thanks for still reading and reviewing, or, in other words, be very patient with me. I know I don't quite deserve this patience. Two more chapters or so, and this story will reach its real conclusion, before the end of the year hopefully.

Now, on with the show, and a little bit of action.

Disclaimer: I own nothing but my DVDs

**CHAPTER THREE: BACK IN BLACK  
**

**Part two: Hope**

_**Thursday, December 28th, 2006**_

_This morning was a nightmare, pure and simple. _

Carlos had called to tell her Sofia had woken up sniffing and coughing and needed to go to the doctor. For a few seconds, she wondered why he felt the need to call at half past six in the morning to relay this kind of information: it was winter, and Sofia always had been prone to catch the most innocuous virus at that time of the year. However, when he went on rambling and announced his precinct had called him, she understood.

Carlos was letting her down, again.

And he was letting their daughter down, which was much, much worse.

So she got up in haste and went to retrieve Sofia to drop her off at her mother's, not without arguing loudly with Carlos, once more. Shouts and insults seemed to be their only way communicating these days. It was exhausting.

It was almost ten o'clock when she finally pushed the bullpen door open. Rearranging her hastily done ponytail, she proceeded to walk to her desk under Danny's attentive observation and Samantha's curious glance. Martin was oblivious, finishing his breakfast at his own desk. As for Vivian, she was occupied in her office, arguing vehemently with a familiar Asian guy. Already tired after her morning marathon, she almost collapsed at her desk and stared at the white board.

The guy had been missing for more than three days now. All the leads they had explored had been dead ends. They were not going anywhere on this case, and Vivian had finally decided to take another one along with Martin, letting Danny, Samantha and Elena struggle with even more dead ends. Ironically enough, the latest case had been solved in less than a day – when she had last seen Martin the night before, he was writing the report in the deserted bullpen – and the main case was back to square one, or almost.

_Yamazaki Hajime_

_80 hours missing_

_Last seen outside a bar in Chinatown_

"The guy Viv is talking to, is he linked to the Yamazaki case? I thought he was Jack's friend."

"Well, yes, and yes," Danny deadpanned, addressing a pointed stare at Samantha. "Small world, isn't it?"

"He was there even before any of us arrived at the office," Martin commented between two bites.

"Maybe he's got some useful information," Elena replied, trying to be positive. "We're not going anywhere with this case, after all. The trail is getting cold, and…"

"Maybe…" Elena smiled. Danny always was quite territorial as far as work was concerned, and he always distrusted outside help, initially at least. "Although, I do wonder how Jack's friend can be connected to our case in such a way he managed to obtain Olczyk's favor in."

"Listen Danny," the blonde agent interrupted their colleague coldly. "I noticed that Yamazaki had made several calls to Okinawa in the last few months. Since my Japanese is like yours, obviously inexistent, I called Shin. Little did I know he would take the next flight to New York…"

"And since when have you been making routine calls to a guy we barely know?" Danny inquired, leaning on his elbows, a thin smile forming on his lips – the same ironic smile usually reserved for the suspects. The _"creepy Asian dude"_, as he had nicknamed him had rubbed him the wrong way back in October.

Elena observed the scene silently; ready to interrupt an argument that could be ugly. Everybody's temper had been quite volatile lately, even more when confronted to a frustrating case. However, they could not afford any argument; they had to stick together.

"Well, Danny," came the chilling answer. "I pride myself to be a more than average agent, and, when I have to solve a case, I know to recognize and seize an opportunity when I see one."

Elena was surprised by this outburst, and a rapid glance around her showed that Danny and Martin were no less astounded. Since the day of Jack's injury, Samantha had been quite subdued, passive almost. She did her job, like an automaton, but the spark had gone, apparently. For the first time in weeks, a glimpse of the old Samantha had reappeared, and Elena was glad to see her colleague and friend ready to defend her professional initiative to the bitter end against Danny's insinuations.

However, before the argument could escalate some more, the door of Viv's office opened at last. The senior agent and their Japanese visitor walked across the bullpen to join the rest of the team. The quite relaxed, but serious, expression on both their faces indicated they had reached some form of agreement, Elena noticed with satisfaction.

"Let me introduce you to Miyabe Shin'ichi. As you all guessed, he's Jack's childhood friend, and as you don't know yet, he's the chief of the Coast Guards of Okinawa prefecture. Yamazaki's an undercover agent and his true identity is Kobe Satoshi."

On her left, Elena could see Martin's mouth open, as if to speak, and she could guess his protest. Since when have Japanese police been doing undercover work on US territory without telling anyone? The man was Jack's friend indeed…

"The police of Okinawa prefecture wishes to apologize for this blatant lack of respect of international agreements," Miyabe cut in, probably sensing the objection as well. "However, it came to my knowledge that Morita, the chief of the clan we're investigating, has placed more than a few informants in our ranks, recruiting them before they joined the police academy and pushing them to reach high functions and key positions. In this context, a formal operation would have put the undercover work in jeopardy, I fear."

The man exposed the facts calmly, his tone light but not leaving much place for discussion.

"Chief Miyabe and I reached an agreement, and Olczyk approved. We're going to collaborate to retrieve the undercover agent, and shut down the US part of Morita's human trafficking ring. As long as the guy spends long years behind the bars, the Japanese authorities don't care where he spends them."

That last remark brought a rather cynical smile to Miyabe's lips: the man wanted the job done, and did not care much for the details.

"Martin and Elena, I need you to go to New Jersey. Apparently, Morita's got some interests in Atlantic City. Danny, you go back to Chinatown with Chief Miyabe's introduction. You may hear another tune this time. Samantha, you take our visitor to his agent's room." Vivian distributed the assignments, visibly glad to keep the ball rolling once more. "As for me, I'm going to have a long talk with our colleagues in Vice."

As Elena collected her things, she noticed the sound of Samantha's fast footsteps and the corresponding clicking heels as she walked Miyabe to the elevator. She looked up to see Martin's relieved expression. Whatever the reason was, the blond agent was apparently back to her usual self.

A new lead for a cold case.

Some valuable help, hopefully.

Samantha's newfound energy.

_This morning wasn't so bad, after all._

* * *

They were stuck in the usual nightmarish Manhattan traffic jam, and no amount of siren and klaxon could open a way through the sea of immobile cars. Samantha hit the driving wheel in frustration. She almost thought she could pass the traffic light this time. Alas, the red light reappeared just before the car in front of them, and said car decided to respect the legislation to the letter.

"Is it a usual morning?" Shin asked, clearly frustrated by their lack of progression as well. A few minutes before, when the traffic light was still far away, she had heard him mumbling about the advantages of the subway and how this wasn't a problem he would encounter at sea…

"Classic morning in Manhattan I'm afraid."

A bunch of cars on the perpendicular street were not as respectful of the law as the 4x4 before the FBI issued car and had rushed into the crossroad. As a result, even if it was green light again, they could not progress at all.

"Morons."

"Yep."

"Speaking about morons," Samantha went on with fake nonchalance. "You could have told me you were coming to New York. Danny thinks I'm a mole, now."

"Sorry about that. I suppose I forgot."

"You aren't really sorry."

"No, I'm not. I was trying to be polite. I'm stuck in a traffic jam with you, and you have a gun…"

"Funny… Disrespect for the most common courtesy and chain of command, lousy sense of humor… Jack and you, it was love at first sight, wasn't it?" Samantha immediately cringed at her own jab that left her totally open to his own inquiries, if he wanted.

"Actually, it was hate at first sight." He turned to her and flashed her with a mocking grin. He was letting her off the hook, for now, and resumed his silent observation. However, the mischief in his eyes showed that the Spanish Inquisition would be back later.

The crossroads was finally behind them. A few miles more and they could turn on their right, and leave the nightmare behind. She hoped so, at least.

"Stop staring at me."

"I'm not."

"No kidding…"

"I'm just thinking about the odds of running to the Starbucks over there," he answered back, waving at the store on their left and joining you back at the next traffic light with two hot coffees."

_This_ was an excellent idea.

"Your odds are pretty good, I'd say," she commented. They had not moved an inch for the last ten minutes.

"Alright."

Amused, Samantha watched her unlikely partner as he slalomed between the stopped cars to the coffee shop. The more she got to know him, the more she could understand how Jack and he had been friends for so long. They shared so much, and she only could begin to imagine the mischief they had caused when they were kids.

_Jack_

When she had left this morning, he was still fast asleep on her couch, sprawled under the cover, a foot sticking out, his mouth slightly agape as he snored softly. In spite of herself, she found him adorable. Memory or no memory, Jack Malone was still Jack Malone. His voice was the same, his gestures were identical. The way he slept unceremoniously had not changed either. It was a comforting sight.

As she had written a note he could find with his coffee and toasts, she had begun to hope once again.

Not of a future with him: she had abandoned these romantic notions long ago.

No, she wanted to get Jack to himself, completely. In front of her lay the proof he was still the same. If he was still the same, he could go back to work. If he could go back to work, he would find a sense of purpose again. She could help him prepare any tests he would have to perform to prove to the FBI he still could be a valuable agent. His lost memories would not be an obsession anymore, and, maybe, just maybe, they would come back to him naturally.

Shin could help her, too…

* * *

Damn, it was cold.

Well, not as cold as in Chicago, but cold nonetheless.

For the hundredth time, Jack walked up and down the street where Shin had asked to meet him. The text message had been quite laconic, and could have been worrying given his current state, but he trusted the guy instinctively, just like he trusted Samantha, and had rapidly distrusted Maria. Their exchanges via e-mail and telephone during the last month had been warm, and fun. Contrary to everyone, Shin talked to him as if he had not lost his memories, and did not walk on eggshells around him. It had been frustrating in the beginning: how could he understand the guy's allusions to past events or movies or books? Yet, he had started to take notes during their conversations and check these allusions. Nothing rang a bell, sadly, but he had quickly discovered that everything Shin talked about appeared on his shelves, in Chicago, and in New York.

Listening to Bob Dylan or Joe Cocker brought him to a warm, reassuring place.

Reading about the exploits of Armstrong and Aldrin made him smile at night.

On a whim, he had brought some _champuru_ home in Chicago and had thoroughly enjoyed the dish, and had been glad to see the girls liked it as well.

So, when he had received the text message earlier this morning, he had swallowed his coffee in one gulp and gathered his things.

The note Samantha had left him explained how to close the door: there was a trick apparently. He had followed the instructions twice and had not managed to close it properly, unable to give a complete turn to the key. Then, he remembered his discussion with Samantha: he had visited her many times in the past, so he had to _know_ how to close the damn door. Putting back the note in his pocket, he tried one last time, following his instinct. His right hand found the right level of pressure while the left lifted the handle very slightly, and the key turned.

So here he was, on a New York pavement, freezing hands in his pockets, trying to fight the morning cold, in front of a sushi restaurant. He was walking down the street once again when he noticed with satisfaction that the sunlight had finally reached his side of the street. Making profit of this new source of warmth, Jack stood in front of the closed restaurant and idly began to read the cart, out of boredom.

All of sudden, he stepped backwards, utterly floored.

He could read it.

He could understand it.

Contrary to the restaurant in Chicago, this one used kanjis on the card – out of snobbishness maybe, or because only Japanese people went there – and he understood every single word of it.

"Found something you like, _gaijin_?" an unknown voice said behind him. Jack did not like the sound of it. His right hand flew to his hip to find nothing. He cursed and chose to turn sharply on his left, bending slightly and using his shoulder and elbow to knock the guy out of the way. Not giving him the time to react, he clenched his right fist and hit him on the chin with a vicious uppercut. Before the guy fell to the ground, he gripped him by the shoulders and finished him with a knee to the stomach. Once again, Jack's left hand went to his back to find nothing.

Fuck.

Fuck.

Who was this guy?

What mess had he rushed into?

Fuck.

"FBI! Hands on your head!" A female voice commanded behind him.

Why did people keep on sneaking up on him? It was unnerving.

"Chill out, Samantha," a male voice cut in. "I think we know this one."

Bastard.

"So this is your definition of a nice cup of coffee, Shin?" Jack asked. He started to wonder why he trusted the guy so much.

"Wait! What test?" Samantha exclaimed as she finished cuffing the knock-out guy.

"The same test you wanted him to take on. The only difference is that I believe more the truth coming out of the field." Shin smiled as he lit a cigarette. "I sent a message to our common friend to join us as soon as we got in the elevator." He considered the man on the ground more seriously and knelt down. Revealing the tattoo on the guy's forearm, he added. "I thought you could help us to search a room, and I didn't imagine we would take so much time to arrive. I'm sorry."

He got up and gave Jack a pat on the shoulder.

"Congrats, _aniki_, you knocked down one of Morita's watchdogs without a gun."

_Great… Now I know I'm brute without memories. Just great…_

* * *

As the trio walked up the narrow stairs with their prisoner, Samantha did not know if she was overjoyed or frightened.

The way Jack had knocked his assailant down was reassuring. Maybe getting him back to work would be even easier than she had thought.

However, she was still trembling when she remembered the scene. What if Jack had not reacted the way he had? What if he had reacted the same when she had threatened him before she could recognize him? Shin had put his friend in a very dangerous situation just because he did not know the hazards of morning traffic in Manhattan.

As they reached the right door, she turned to watch Jack. He finished climbing the stairs, hands in his pockets, apparently lost in his thoughts, which was understandable given his current situation. However, this would not do in the field…

"Sorry to disturb you, but, whatever Shin says, if you can't pay attention to your surroundings, I'm sending you back home. My boss, who's taking some lengthy vacations, doesn't forgive this kind of error easily."

"I'll try to stay out of the doghouse, then," he answered lightly, not without checking the stairs they had just climbed. "Still clear." The grin she loved so much, the one that reached his eyes, formed on his lips, almost timidly.

If Olczyk knew, he would have a heart attack. An agent on medical leave, without a gun, on in the field…

They were breaking more and more regulations, as usual.

She did not care, they had each other back, as usual.

"So, if I understand you right," Danny repeated, buying time to digest the flow of information he was receiving from the old shopkeeper, "this man burglarized your shop thrice in the last month." He was showing the Japanese agent's photo. "Yet, when I talked to you the other day, you told me you didn't know the guy."

"Now, I remember."

The first time he had tried to investigate the circumstances of the agent's disappearance, he had encountered a wall of silence and barely veiled hostility. Now, a simple visit to some priest with a letter from Miyabe had opened all the doors. Apparently, Jack's friend was well introduced into the diaspora from Honk Kong, which was logical given his job, and the relative proximity of Okinawa from the once British and now Chinese island.

"Can you tell me when it happened exactly, Ma'am?"

"Last Wednesday, the Wednesday before, and the Wednesday even before."

"Did he rob anything?"

"I didn't give him the time. I called police. He broke my window," she gestured to the shattered window-pane, and the bricks she had gathered as evidence.

The agent smirked, imaging the old woman chasing after the delinquent, armed with her cane.

"Thank you, Ma'am. That would be all for the moment."

Danny concluded his interview and went back to the busy street. Why on earth would the Japanese agent act like a stupid, young delinquent? Because it all had been an act. When they had started the case, they thought _Yamazaki_ was a yakusa, and they had tried to follow a thug's reasoning. Now, they knew he was not a _yakusa_. They had to put themselves in Kobe's shoes as an agent.

_As an undercover agent._

Why would he throw a stone through a window-pane each Wednesday? He was sure to attract unwanted attention.

Why would he _risk_ attracting the police's attention?

Why would he _want_ to attract the police's attention to _this_ shop?

He looked at the innocuous shop. There was nothing there but soft drinks, beers, snacks and postal cards.

Why would he _want_ to attract the police's attention _around_ this shop?

Danny looked around him, and smirked, finally.

A few yards down the street, on the other side, he could see a rather average bar. However, the girls in front of the door were nothing but average, and obviously underage.

His expression became harder as he took out his telephone. At last he could agree with Miyabe on something.

This Morita guy was some piece of work.


	9. Back in black part three

****So here we are almost at the end... It's been a long, bumpy ride but thank you for your patience. Last chapter will be published around Christmas, as a parting gift to an outstanding fandom and a wonderful show which deserved better.

Many thanks to DianeM for her beta skills, and her talent to remind me of my duties and all the gang at YTDAW. I miss the good old days, really!

**Part three: Okinawa**

_Thursday, December 28th, 2006_

_Kobe Satoshi, 83 hours missing_

"It's useless, guys, the damn flat is empty."

Samantha let out a sigh of frustration as she tried to find _anything_ that could suggest the wall she was currently inspecting was not as empty as it seemed. She knocked on the wall, attentive to the merest different sound. She felt the surface, searching for an unexpected asperity. She used all her training to discover evidence, any evidence, in vain.

"The apartment had been cleaned up recently," Shin added darkly. "We lost too much time, and Morita made sure to cover his tracks. _Fuck!_" He punched the shelves he was standing next to, unable to conceal his own growing anger. His sudden agitation did not achieve anything but shattering the already precarious equilibrium of the piece of furniture that crumbled loudly in a cloud of dust.

The morning light that filtered across the windows briefly made the microscopic floating particles glow before they settled again on the floor.

No words were exchanged.

Maybe they were too late after all.

Hopefully, the rest of the team would find something helpful. _Anything._

Samantha walked to the bedroom they had abandoned to Jack's inspection. His prolonged silence was not every encouraging, in many senses. Maybe he had come empty, as they had in the dining room. Maybe he was all over his head and refused to acknowledge it. The first hypothesis was disheartening for their case. The second one was saddening on a more personal front. As she stepped into the room, Samantha mused she liked neither of these ideas.

"Found anything?"

"Nope."

The sight that welcomed the young agent was confusing. Actually, it was quite normal if Jack had not found anything, he was not searching at all. All this experience was premature, she should have known it!

The former senior agent had sat down by the window and seemed totally absorbed in his contemplation of the Okinawa map on the wall facing him.

"Shin, I suppose your agent was well trained." This was barely a question, more a working hypothesis.

"Nah, I sent a green foot undercover," the irony in Shin's voice was biting. "Of course I sent a seasoned agent, one of my best! What d'you think?"

"I think that, if the genius downstairs is any example, Morita's guys aren't too bright. Maybe they missed something." There was something very familiar in Jack's voice, the hint of a tone Samantha had longed to hear for so long.

She had to keep the ball rolling.

For the case.

For Jack.

"Guys," she interrupted. "Remember Danny's report, the man was a sneaky one. Maybe he left something in _plain sight_ for somebody able to see it, and invisible for anybody else."

"Well, I'm his boss, and I don't see anything." Shin was getting angrier, and more worried, by the minute.

"Shin? When did you send your guy?" Jack spoke again after another moment of silent contemplation.

"Three months ago, why?"

"Did you tell him about me, what I did in the FBI?"

"I told him to contact you in case of extreme emergency only, why?"

Samantha hid a mischievous grin with difficulty before speaking up. Shin may have been Jack's friend for ages, but _she_ was his partner. Bouncing ideas was what they used to do.

_All the time._

"Three months ago, Jack still had all his head," she explained. "You think he left something for you?"

"Well, as far as he knows, I'm the head of the Missing Persons unit, and not some useless amnesiac."

Jack was right, of course, but she hated hearing him using such terms when he spoke about himself. She almost protested, but he cut her, going on with his line of thoughts.

"You told him I grew up in Okinawa?"

"Of course, and that your father was a US soldier, and about everything… You're still more or less a legend back home, you know."

"Why?"

"Because, to this day, you're the only one who had ever kicked Morita's ass on a regular basis, when we were kids." The memory brought a fugitive, nostalgic smile on Shin's face.

Samantha searched Jack's face for any sign of recognition, in vain. However, the satisfied grin at the idea he had been somebody's nightmare in the past was another proof that Jack was still there, deep inside.

"Your guy, where's he from?"

"From Yomitan, why?"

"Then, why does the insignia for Yomitan Airbase look awfully wrong to me?"

Shin turned around sharply to consider the map. After a few seconds, his eyes widened.

"Because it _is_ wrong, _aniki_."

Jack's friend took a few steps to the other side of the room, for closer inspection of the map Jack alluded to. Silently, Samantha observed him as he frowned, scratched around the area of the insignia, as if trying to peel some sort of a sticker off.

New evidence that could lead them to their missing person was not the only thing at stake here, and Samantha was painfully aware of the sheer importance of the moment.

If Jack was right, it would mean he had made his first decisive steps towards recovery.

Shin finally turned around to face his friends with a hopeful smile forming on his lips.

"Well done, J-kun."

Samantha took the minuscule sticker Shin handed her and read the numbers that designated a locker in Grand Central Station.

A clue.

They had a clue.

And Jack was probably the one who had broken the case.

_84 hours missing_

"Danny, did you get anything?" Vivian called her agent while she forced her way through the crowd the operation had attracted around the bar. Danny snorted and thought it was high time to call for some more uniforms. This kind of situation could evolve quickly.

"Not really. No girl is willing to talk, and I can't blame them, honestly."

Of course, he was a seasoned agent, and very few things really bothered him. However, the sight of lost, scared girls, agglutinated on the pavement while the police searched the bar where they worked and Immigration proceeded to check their IDs and visas always made him feel sick in the stomach.

These girls were caught between a rock and a hard place, and they knew it, if their scared expressions were any proof. They had risked everything to change their lives and had trusted shallow promises, only to find exploitation and possible expulsion at the end of the day.

Danny did not like the mix of relief and accusation he could find in the girls' eyes, and he liked the role he had to play even less.

"We have to connect this bar to Morita, Danny. We have to interrogate them." As usual, Vivian was an example of calm demeanor, not betraying what she was feeling deep inside.

"Of course, we do. Hopefully, we'll be able to make a connection with whatever Elena and Martin can find in Atlantic City."

_85 hours missing_

"An honest Japanese citizen who had made some good investments in the US, right… Do you believe this bullshit?" Sarcasm covered Elena's every word as Martin and she were taking in the brand new hotel casino before them.

"And he called this _Okinawa_? Give me a break!" Martin muttered. "Two solutions: the man is a complete moron, which I doubt, or he's awfully sure about the soundness of his cover."

He let Elena step first into the tropical heat of the casino.

"Maybe a little bit of both?" she asked mirthlessly and showed the main attraction in the casino, apart from the tables and the machines. The right side of building was occupied by an interior swimming pool designed to look like the sea and a makeshift sandy beach. "Wanna bet the sand is advertised to be from Okinawa for real?"

"I'll pass," Martin snorted. "I am a lousy poker player, but I know to recognize when my odds are awfully bad."

An anxious manager had noticed the two agents and walked to greet them, all smiles and good manners.

"Not anonymous for long, are we?" Elena joked as she retrieved her badge.

"Must be the coat…" Martin plunged a hand in his pocket as well. "Wanna bet these girls in kimonos are far from being eighteen?"

"Nope. But I'll add this to my list of questions for…"

"I am Kentarou Otah, Mr Morita's chief manager. What can I do for you?"

"I am Agent Fitzgerald from the FBI, and this is Agent Delgado. We have some question for you."

Vivian was positively livid. How could they have taken such a risk? From the short exchange with Shin, she had feared this was the kind of reckless action he could launch, and had warned him sternly. Obviously, the warning had fallen into deaf ears, but Samantha should have known better. Of course, there was nothing she could have done about Jack's encounter with the stupid Yakuza. However, she should have sent him home immediately, and reported the incident to Vivian.

What if they had met a welcome comity in the room?

Vivian shuddered at the thought.

To be fair, it was not the first time Samantha was reckless when Jack was concerned. Both the blond agent and the MPU supervisor had showed more than once their reckless tendencies when the other was concerned.

Furthermore, if the content of the locker scattered on the table at the center of the bullpen was any proof, Vivian had to admit that Jack had still his mojo intact, which was unexpected, unhoped-for good news.

Yet, this did not mean she would accept another breach of protocol. Jack was on medical leave, with reason, and his place was not in the field.

"This isn't a negotiation, Chief Miyabe. Actually, I've got enough to throw you off the case, so consider yourself lucky. In Japan, you may do as you please, but this is my turf. My turf, my rules, understood?" Years of working with Jack had prepared her to confront a pain in the ass like Shin. Those men were carbon copies of each other.

"I suppose so, but let me object one last time that few people know Morita like Jack does."

"Objection dully noted. Now carry on, Danny is waiting for us in the interrogation rooms." Once she was sure she had made her point, Vivian finally made a little concession. Some more desk work could juggle more flashes of knowledge and memory. In the safety of the MPU, this was a risk she was willing to take. "Meanwhile, Jack, you can always try to solve the puzzle," she added, waving nonchalantly at the table.

It was no use to put pressure on the man's shoulders.

All was needed was a spark, she was sure of it now.

_86 hours missing_

The clicking of the keyboards.

The hurried steps on the carpet.

The sound of a printer.

The ringing of the telephones.

The noisy, nervous atmosphere of the office would drive any sane person crazy, but to Jack, it sounded like _home_. Strangely enough, he found it very easy to concentrate in this incessant hum of activity.

He found it easy to block the outside world and focus on the puzzle in front of him. Instinctively, he had gathered the bank statements in one place, the phone statements in another one and had begun to search for parallels, recurrences, anything that seemed strange to him.

Jack had no idea why or how, but he knew how to proceed.

_It was evident_.

The sheer familiarity of the work was almost overwhelming, just like when he stepped into the bedroom at Kobe's place and immediately felt something was amiss.

He felt focused, in his element.

Then the flashes started.

At first, he paid them no attention, concentrated as he was on a ledger that made no sense at all. These were not the accounts of shop or a bar, the figures were impossible, the entries written in Japanese were totally fantasist.

"_Shin! Come down! We're waiting for you! Bring your ball and glove!" From the streets, Jack and the rest of the gang were calling for their best pitcher. Without him, the fourth years would kick their asses big time. _

"_Can't… I have to revise my kanjis. My grandmother almost had an attack when I confused the damn signs and wants me recite them in front of the whole family next Sunday."_

A kanji could have different significations. This was some code and he needed Shin to break it.

"Baka_! We've been searching for the damn chest in wrong place the whole time!"_

_Usually, this customary insult from Shin would have been repaid by a smack on the head, but Jack was too exhausted from the digging they did all afternoon, for naught._

"_No kidding," he just commented, staring angrily at the dozens of holes they had dug since midday._

"_The chest is over there, in the sea, I'm sure."_

"_I hope you are because there are sharks over there, as well!" Jack protested. _

"_No risk, no gain, _aniki_."_

"Finding anything?" a familiar voice enquired.

_Samantha_

The sound of her voice.

The smell of her perfume.

The feel of her hand on his shoulder.

This was very familiar as well, almost too familiar.

"Dunno. Maybe. I've the feeling that these books aren't mere accounting documents." Then he added, showing a particular set of documents, "Moreover, this Miyamoto Musashi seems a bit phony to me, and he reappears a lot in the different statements."

"Why phony?"

"Do you have many associates called Wyatt Earp?"

"Makes sense… By the way, are you talking about these characters as if it was common knowledge or is it wishful thinking on my part?" Her tone was hopeful, vulnerable almost.

"The hell if I know. I've kept on blurting things out since this morning. Must be your coffee."

_A bed. Rain outside. The smell of coffee coming from the dining room. Crosswords abandoned on the night table._

A hint of embarrassment could be heard in her next words.

"Is it Mr Musashi's photo, here?"

"I suppose, why?"

"Good, because, he looks just like the sketch we obtained from the terrified girls down in Interrogations, and the only name they know is Goro-san." Samantha posed to retrieve her phone and show another picture to Jack. "And he happens to look like this man a great deal. Meet Otah Kentarou. Elena and Martin talked to him in Atlantic City, and slipped between their fingers. We have a BOLO on him and his car."

_The bullpen. A photo on the white board. Samantha getting up from her chair and meeting him in his office, proof in hand._

"Anything else?" Samantha pressed on, ready to deal with her next task.

God! So that was the rhythm he was used to, in his work, and apparently, in his life: always rushing from a task to another one, always following the hint of a lead, then another one, until the missing person was found. It was exhausting and the mere pair of hours he had spent on the content of the locker had given him the worst headache.

But the rush of adrenaline when he had finally made sense of the puzzle had been worth it. Bouncing ideas with Samantha and her rewarding smile had been more than worth it.

"I don't know," he answered truthfully.

Samantha raised an eyebrow, waiting for him to go on, obviously resisting the urge of some teasing remark.

"For your information, half my hard drive is fried. It's a miracle it's still functioning, y'know," he answered her silent mockery. He did not know why, but he felt that preemptive attacks were the way to go with her if you wanted to survive the day with your pride intact.

"Don't play the humility card, Jack, it doesn't suit you."

"It doesn't?"

"No, you can gloat all you want…"

Her voice had a… husky tone? He decided he enjoyed bantering with her.

Jack sobered up and focused on the documents once more. A detail still bothered him, but without his knowledge, he was unable to say if it was important or not. He handed her a sheet of paper. "Where's that neighborhood?"

Samantha took the paper and frowned in concentration.

"Nice one, and at the opposite of Kobe's apartment, albeit on the same line of the metro. Why?"

"Because there's this wallet, with an ID and a driving license registered to the name of Joe Kabuki, American citizen, and a salesman for EA Electronics. This address appears in these documents, on some other cards as well. The problem is that Joe Kabuki sounds as phony to me as Musashi. We need to check this up."

"We? Geez Jack, go on that way and in a few minutes, you're going to assign the tasks to the team."

"I'm sorry," he replied with an apologetic grin. The flashes had stopped but he was beginning to blurt out things without even knowing why. "Just getting ahead of myself, I guess."

"Don't be sorry for that." Samantha's smile was sweet, proud almost. "Phony, why?"

"Do you know many Clark Kents?"

"Not really. And you know this how?" She was testing him, obviously.

"The hell if I know," he shrugged. One day at the office did him more good than a whole month of family life. Jack ignored if he had to be frightened or enthusiastic about that.

"No matter. I need to check this, but I've the feeling you just found Kobe's hiding place. The man's not missing, he's hiding. Morita must have discovered he was undercover."

A gentle hand went to the white hair that underlined his scar.

"Not so bad for a half-fried hard drive, not bad at all."

For the first time in what seemed ages, Jack let a genuine, relaxed smile form on his lips.

_Indeed, not bad at all… In many senses…_


End file.
